It was so good to be back in Hongkong over Christmas. It felt very much like we had been away for a long holiday and came home. Very weird. Of course we spent a lot of time with friends but we also had the chance to see some projects we worked on the past year like this City Square logo and a MTR-ad at Wan Chai (exit A5 and A1/2). Hopefully 2016 will continue to bring projects and reasons to come back.
Although this is only a mini-mini-interview I conducted for One World Magazine (november 2015), I do want to share it with you anyway. Why? Because it’s the perfect opportunity to introduce Manya Koetse and her super cool website whatsonweibo.com. She is a fascinating Sinologist and editor, providing cultural, historical and political insights into trending topics on China’s social media.
The first time I heard her speak was in a panel discussion on women’s rights in China and I thought she was by far the most interesting person on stage. While the others were talking in general about issues, she used all kinds of examples and little stories to illustrate her point.
Show, don’t tell… totally my cup of tea!
Don’t you agree that autumn in the Netherlands has been lovely so far? The colours of the trees were amazing. The Vondelpark in Amsterdam looked like it was on fire constantly. Walks in the park inspired the new series of ads for HKWJ/Triple Eight. Orange is the new black:)!
Here some snapshots of the Exhibition ‘Aging Dragons’ that was connected to the urban planners conference ‘Beyond Big Plans’ in Seoul this month.
The exhibition was all about post-growth of the big developed Asian cities like Hong Kong, Seoul, Singapore, Taipei and Tokyo. The ‘Hong Kong – Boring City’ research project that I’m working on together with Inge Goudsmit was part of it.
What an awesome last day of the year it was. On the 31st of December Kathleen Ferrier and I were able to look back on the Hong Kongs’ political turbulent year with Benny Tai, one of the main Occupy Central (With Love and Peace) leaders. Interviewing him really inspired me, not only in a professional way but also on a personal level. Although it’s quite obvious he prefers to ‘hide’ in his study full of books and plants, he feels it’s his duty to speak up. Such a humble man, full of hope and strong ideas for Hong Kongs’ political future. I hope some of them come true in 2015.
We wrote this article about the interview in Nederlands Dagblad (Dutch Daily Newspaper).
Loved to work with the Urban Discovery team on this Exhibition at the RICS Heritage Conservation Conference. Heritage conservation in Hong Kong is a challenge which generates strong views in the community and presents a range of interesting issues. I made the design (in close cooperation with Lisette van Rijn and Grace Lee) of these exhibition-panels. Each one evaluates the re-use of a particular heritage buildings in Hong Kong.
Some Revitalisation concept are super cool. My personal favourite: a resettlement housing estate that turned into a hostel (Mei Ho House). After the conference, the exhibition will be relocated to Blue House in Wan Chai so you can check out all the fascinating stories and struggles that are connected to Hong Kong’s most fascinating urban renewal projects.
A new issue of Hollandse Nieuwe is out (I did the lay-out and design as usual). The theme of this magazine is Autumn Blues and it’s about all the lovely festivals, concerts and music-events in Hong Kong this autumn. Very practical to be up-to-date again myself on the secret music venues where all the ‘cool cats’ go:). You can read/see the complete magazine here (in Dutch).
Some projects are so lovely to work on that you hate to finish them. End of this summer I worked on the catalogue and exhibition-printwork / window stickers for a very special exhibition called Parisian Zoo. It was a 2 week event all about vintage animal jewellery organised by the experts of Palais Royal in Hong Kong.
For the catalogue I used the idea of an old-fashioned zoo with different sections. Every page had a different product-photo and each time a different section/text-box was filled with details. It was really a pleasure to work with these art and design loving people:)
I wrote about the Boring City Project before, remember? It’s a research project on Hong Kong’s housing estates that I’m doing with Inge Goudsmit since we’re both interested in topics at the intersection of architecture and psychogeography.
This summer we heard that our proposal for a big article in MONU (an international architectural magazine) was accepted. So we re-worked our data into an article about the relationship between housing estates and indoor urbanism (the overall-theme for the october-issue).
Hong Kong is a dual city; a metropolis where numerous parallel indoor worlds co-exist alongside the traditional, intense and vibrant city. It was fascinating to dive into the history of why/where this urban fabric originated and how it influences Hong Kong’s citizens.
This is one of the infographics that we included in our set of images.
I made this set of brochures for Union Church, Hong Kong. They will put the booklets in their new welcome packet; a really cool tote-bag that I helped design as well. No sample yet. Will put it online as soon as I have it:).
Studio Refill Ltd 