Coming from a city that never sleeps, I've grown up with a fast-paced, round the clock and immediate lifestyle. In Hong Kong, you barely have to wait for anything. Miss the train? Doesn't matter, the next will arrive within 2 minutes. Hungry at 4 in the morning? Order take-away and it arrives at your doorstep within 20 minutes. I would say I've taken this kind of lifestyle for granted and never really saw it as something worth taking note of.. until I moved to London.

Many people would say London is incredible... life is on high-speed and things can't be done any quicker, you can't get from one place to the other any faster.. and when I tell them that actually, London only really functions at what I would say around 70% of the speed of Hong Kong they look at me as if I'm completely out of my mind. Truth is, London was relatively slow for me when I first moved there. I couldn't believe how long I had to wait for buses, how long it took for my food to arrive, how long it took to pay for something. But it seems like I've slowly grown accustomed to the speed, slowly adapted to having more patience.

Now that I'm back at home I realize how serious this high-speed syndrome actually is. The day I arrived in Hong Kong, I was again amazed at the time it took for me to land, get off the plane, get through customs and reach the baggage hall. Normally this would take around 10 to 20 minutes depending on where the gate was. I reached the baggage hall well within 15 minutes and expected to be leaving with my baggage in the next 10 minutes or so. When I reached the conveyor belt, there was already a sign saying "BA27- Baggage delays due to technical problems. We apologize for any inconveniences caused". Compared to my nightmare in heathrow 5 days ago when I waited with no announcements at all for 10 hours for my "delayed" flight which never even happened at the end, this was literally like heaven. It took the airport staff less than 10 minutes to get their act together and inform passengers of the delay.. of their BAGGAGES.
10 minutes passed and the conveyor belt was still empty. An announcement about baggage delays was made soon after but people were already starting to get impatient. Eventually after almost an hour of waiting, we were informed that they are still having problems and that we should leave our contacts and the baggages would be sent to us to our home address. I thought to myself... well, luckily I have most of what I need either on me or at home anyway.. so a week without my baggage should be fine. It was then that I overheard one of the airport staff telling passengers that their luggage should be sent to them by midnight or tomorrow morning at the latest. I was so surprised I thought I heard the wrong thing. If this were London, my baggages would get to me in 2 weeks if I were lucky. So I happily filled in my details and left the airport, feeling blessed that I'm home again at the worlds most efficient city. But actually, this was just the beginning. As everyone knows about BA, there's always a delay with them. Flights, baggage, whatever. So although they said they'd deliver by midnight or the next morning, everyone doubted it would actually happen. And it didn't.. my baggage arrived around 30 hours after my arrival. But during those 30 hours, my mum was constantly calling BA to ask when my baggage would be arriving and my dad was constantly complaining about their poor management. This whole situation even managed to get itself on the news where people complained that their baggage weren't delivered to them within the expected time frame! I almost couldn't believe it... whether Hong Kong has evolved into some insatiable and spoilt city or whether I have just regressed and expected less out of this so-called "efficiency" of a city.. I'm not sure.

But this whole personal experience has made me think about what I would like to write for my contextual report. Thinking about the 24-hour society, how has this made an impact on lifestyles and consequently on design itself? Has the development of the 24-hour society been the outcome of human's never-ending demands and is design feeding this act of over-demanding and over-consuming lifestyle?

potential topics for contextual report:

personal time:
-expressing time through objects:
historical objects, personal items, photographs
objects as an indicator of time

mechanical time:
-60 seconds=?

mix of both:
the value of time.. are we slowly losing this through our 24 hour society?

4 mini briefs

1. Slowing down time vs. Speeding up time
-ways of showing time in slow motion and in fast forward. go for extremes
-personal experiences of how different countries/nations perceive time: Hong Kong, London, Munich, Taipei
-possible medium: film?

“Clocks and watches are now far more accurate than we need them to be in our daily lives... Perhaps this need to be in possession of the exact time reflects some fault in our perception of the world, and a defect in our grasp of space-time. Obsessive attention to microscopic detail is usually a symptom of underlying neurosis. Confident people carry neither money nor watches, and expect the world to keep time with them.”
- JG Ballard

2. Einstein's Dreams
-designing 30 objects that can work as time measuring devices in these 30 different worlds

3. Time frames
-further exploring the use of photography as a medium for capturing time frames for different people
-disposable camera that can be rewound and reused
-find 2 people with different relationships:
eg. 2 people who are in the same career, family members living in different parts of the world,

4. Ways of physically capturing time
-further development of roses immersed in resin

24hrs

how much can you do in 24hours?
mapping a day where i recorded everything i did and the duration of each event:



i did this by creating a grid system that divides into 24 sections by which i can "fill in" with the events of the day:

roses are red, violets are blue..

have been trying to explore ways of bringing time to a standstill in our physical world. so as a starting point, i bought a bouquet of white roses and painted them in resin to record each stage of their growth.

mixed feelings about the outcome so far.. the resin took a while to dry out completely, which i suspect has caused the roses themselves to wilt faster than the resin could "freeze" them in time. so some of the roses do look more dead than they do alive.. which wasn't what i was hoping for!

i do think though this unexpected result isn't entirely disappointing. i suppose then it in a way shows how time that isnt captured fast enough just dies. very literally.


also i found the resin a bit too thickly painted on. i don't really like that kind of aesthetic quality it creates as it feels very artificial and also it's a bit to shiny for my liking. so taking these points on board, i've made a few alterations of my "freezing" process:


the roses will now be submerged in the vase of water as opposed to hung and dried in mid-air. perhaps then while the resin is drying on it, the flower can still breath and is alive. the resin coating is also thinner..

treasure each moment

recently I've experienced things that have changed me into a completely different person. my priorities list was unbalanced and I've neglected what should've mattered to me the most. it was only until a couple of days ago that I realized what has become of me and my life.. which sparked this whole idea of "treasure each moment". I still can't get over this quote by Tennessee Williams:

"Has it ever struck you…that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by so quickly you hardly catch it going"

it is in a way very sentimental, very melancholy. very sad that each moment that passes by is so fast that you simply cannot grasp it in your hands. it is out of your control and it is what makes time beautiful in a sense that one moment in time can never be lived twice.

it scares me that i'm changing topics now but it took a lot of courage to do so as well! now i can only hope that i'll be able to catch up with things and gain more insight into the direction that i want to be going with my final year project.

what i want to investigate now besides the theories behind time (circadian clock, biological clocks, the solar system etc..) is how to capture the essence of time. are we able to capture a moment in time? is there something more substantial, more thought-provoking than simply photographs?

list of things to do and places to go to:
-live a day without knowing the time.. this would require more preparation than the actual experiment! will have to cover all clocks around the house and find a way to remove the time off my phone..
-visit National Maritime Museum
-ways of "capturing time" in nature: perhaps buying a bouquet of flowers and recording their every stage of life by "freezing" them in resin?
-visit Kew Gardens
-look into Einstein's theories of time
-create my own mini time measuring devices

what is TIME..?

"Has it ever struck you... that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quickly you hardly catch it going?"
-Tennessee Williams

This quote has really got me thinking.. about Time.
What is Time? Something which we live by everyday... which our lives revolve around. Is Time merely a number? A date? An hour?

Time at present is a number. Yet Time in the past is a Memory.

Time is marked by Memories. Memories chart every stage of your life and lets us have a past.

“We all have our time machines. Some take us back, they're called memories. Some take us forward, they're called dreams.”
-Jeremy Irons

We don't remember days or times... we remember moments in time.
What would be a way of capturing moments in time that is more than just numbers? More than just an hour on the clock, a date on the calendar?

"Time is the most undefinable yet paradoxical of things; the past is gone, the future is not come, and the present becomes the past even while we attempt to define it, and, like the flash of lightning, at once exists and expires."
-Charles Caleb Colton

clocking dreams / dreaming clocks

inspiration of the day

to my fellow design comrades in the midst of our final project battlefield..


thinking = good
over-thinking = bad
over-thinking + stressing over something you're meant to be passionate about = super bad

who's the final answer for? and who says you need one anyway?
so just make a quick decision, don't think too hard. and enjoy it :)

danke, nohanjes!

capturing TIME?

one thing that really fascinates me is when I ask someone about dreams, I often get this answer:
"I don't actually remember my dreams.. I don't know if I've dreamt last night"
as someone who dreams almost every night and remembers them quite clearly, I find dreaming to be such a wonderful thing. and I actually feel quite sorry for those who don't remember their dreams at all. perhaps because I'm a typical piscean, I live in my own dreamland most of the time anyway as opposed to reality. how sad would I be if I couldn't escape to my dreams every night and run away from all the troubles I need to face in reality!

we spend about 1/3 of our lives asleep, and about 20% of sleep is REM sleep for adults. On average, a person can dream from anywhere between 4 to 7 dreams every night.

that's almost 7% of our lifetime away in dreamland.

could there possibly be a way to capture this amount of time and let those who are not able to realize they've dreamed, to come to appreciate the amount of time they've spent in another world?

where to go?

right. i have reached a dead end on trying to decide which direction to go and it's only been a week into officially launching the 3rd year project!

thing is, there are so many things that i'm fascinated about.. but i just don't know where to start. it's hard for me to keep order of what i want to do and how i want to progress since i'm a person who needs a very structured, logical path in order to do things. so diving in head first is not my style. it really isn't!

so i've decided to just write.. and keep writing.. write about what i've found so far, what my intentions are, what possibilities lie ahead of me. and hopefully things will all string together and come together in one piece as opposed to many different random things as it is now.

so, first.. dreams. i find it really interesting whether dreams are a reflection of reality, or an escape of reality. scientists believe that we dream in order to secure and revive our memory, kind of like putting a seal on top of our day to contain the events that have occurred so we can use this information later on in our lives. but pyschoanalysts believe that dreams are a reflection of our subconscious.. what isn't actually there. what isn't actually touchable, tangible.. a reality we wish to fulfill.

some scientists also believe that we dream in order to process emotions, like "resetting the north of our emotional compass". this is what ties in tune with what the psychoanalysts say of dreams reflecting your true emotions.

in a BBC documentary, Prof. Robert Stickgold mentions that "the nightmares what we dream prepare us in our waking life. Rehearsing stressful events help us deal with the events ahead. Without nightmares or bad dreams.. humanity may not exist"

is it possible to design for something that's actually non-existent? Designing to capture these emotions you release during the process of dreaming?

something else i'm interested in, which also relates to the whole idea of reality or not is the idea of subjective realities. mainly the idea of fantasy and why we're so captivated by it. take fiction and film such as twilight, lord of the rings, harry potter. or simply fairytales of cinderella, snow white or the little mermaid. as a child, it's understandable that we are fascinated by these make-believe worlds of fantasy. but even as adults, these stories continue to fascinate us. they're just the same, except that they deal with much more complex issues. but they are still make-believe.

so do we become engrossed in fantasy worlds in order to escape our own realities?
if so, what benefits are there?
what are the reasons in us doing this?
does this in some way reflect society in that we don't want to face the truths of what's become of us today?
are there any ways of designing for this?
do these tinted realities tie in with our way of dreaming to escape reality?

why are people obsessed with a reality that's not our own?

even something like Disneyland, Warner Bro's, Movie World theme parks. a place for children? no, not really... for grown adults too. but why? why do we enjoy escaping into these make-believe worlds

is it possible to design something that provokes or reflect these needs of escaping reality?

catching shadows

There's a fantastic exhibition going on at the V&A at the moment which sparked a lot of new ideas and inspiration for my project. "Catching Shadows" showcases works by photographers Susan Derges, Adam Fuss, Garry Fabian Miller and Floris Neusüss who all create photographs without the use of a camera. Instead they place the subject directly between the photographic paper and the light source. The results are a collection of thought provoking glimpses of what could've existed.

"My Ghost" series, Adam Fuss

This was one of my favourite photogram series by Adam Fuss. It's amazing how there can be so little information about the subject in the photogram, yet so much more emotion is captured compared to a normal photograph. This series "expresses the idea of a human presence that is lost but recalled momentarily by its traces, both physical and emotional."

Körperfotogramm, Floris Neusüss

Neusüss' works removes the objects from their physical context, encouraging the viewer to contemplate the essence of the form. Movement of the subject is captured in a way that allows the audience to engage in the world of abstract forms.

"Bin Gleich Zurück/Be right Back", Floris Neusüss

"Bin Gleich Zurück" is an installation of a chair stood on top of a photogram which retains the shadow of a person who was sitting on it. This installation especially caught my attention, as it plays with the notion of capturing something which has once existed; a moment in time which is now lost, yet so vividly captured in the essence of its form.

"Images made with a camera imply a documentary role. In contrast, camera-less photographs show what has never really existed. They are also always 'an original' because they are not made from a negative. Encountered as fragments, traces, signs, memories or dreams, these images leave room for the imagination transforming the world of objects into a world of visions."


It's like seeing the world in a completely different form. Like dreaming a reality which is questionable, a reality which is created by the audience's own thoughts.

material world vs. digital world

I reckon being born in the 80's/90's means being torn between generations of tradition and rapid development of new adopted ways of life. We're the generation that has grown up alongside the growth of technology yet our childhood years still had that taste of old-fashioned lifestyle. We're like a blend between the two. For example, take the old school cassette player. I've owned one of those. Then along came the CD player, the MD player, the MP3 player and now the itouch. Things move along at such a pace without us even realizing, yet we grow along with it, and it has become part of our lifestyle to constantly adapt to new technology.

I would still talk with friends about the childhood days.. coming home from school and watching tv, reading a book or meeting at the playground with other kids in the neighbourhood. a pretty normal childhood. but kids nowadays... it's all that tech-savvy stuff on the computer and psp's and wii's and x-box and.. to be honest, no kid really plays on the playgrounds anymore. they all stay in and get sucked into this digitalized world... which is such a pity because there's just so much more out there to explore than the latest computer game.

One thing I really can't get over is the introduction of reading tablets like these:


what's wrong with these:

?

sure, youre saving a whole lot of paper and space. but the whole physicality.. the smell of old books, the ability to hold a book in your hands, flick a page, pencil in notes and fold corners- that's all gone. personally, I'm someone who likes to connect with the physical world. I like the feeling of being able to use all my senses to see, touch, smell, hear, taste the world. but with the uncontrollable development of technology, I feel that humans are slowly starting to lose this sense of physicality and mentality of cherishing things. can humans really have a connection with a book thats on a screen? actually, can that even be considered as a "book"? or perhaps just a screen with words that came from a book?



this is why I invest in things like analogue cameras and polaroids. I always feel that with digital cameras, one can take hundreds of photos of the same thing, yet it won't truly capture the mood, the atmosphere, the feeling of what's in the photo at that time. However with just one photograph taken on film, it becomes a whole different story. Perhaps it's because you know there could only ever be one. So would this mean the whole idea of only being "one" is why the material world is losing against the digital world? That people are becoming more and more insatiable, wanting more of everything and anything?

mini mini mini

i have a thing for miniature things

mini macaron...

mini ballerinas....

mini boot...


Looking beyond the whole idea of "cuteness", what I like is that simply by changing the scale of something that is usually perceived as mundane suddenly catches a lot of attention. I like collecting small items mostly because of their craftsmanship and they all carry a memory with them.

The macaron is from my most recent visit to Taipei. I spotted it at a small flea market in my district. The ballerinas were added to my collection of miniatures after a trip to Venice. Known for its beautiful glass ornaments, we walked past hundreds of shops with glass vases, jewellery, figurines.. you name it. But only these little ballerinas caught my eye and I instantly knew I had to take them home with me. My background of Ballet was the primary reason for my attraction to these small items, but I was also very impressed by the minute details on them.

Finally, the miniature item which I treasure the most out of my whole collection is my little golden boot. My mum has an old friend who makes shoes. Boots, to be specific. He was an old american man my mum met on the plane possibly 30 years ago or more. He treated my mum just like he'd treat his very own daughter. When I was born, he made a miniature boot out of gold. I wore it every day as a child and still do now. Funny, I've only met this man once. But the image of him stuck with me forever. Now I'm not sure whether he's still alive or not but if he were.. I hope he knows this little golden boot is the most cherished one of my entire shoe collection.

home is where the heart is (?)

I'm not entirely sure if this is something to complain about. but it's something that's stuck with me for my entire life and recently even more so. the whole feeling of not belonging anywhere.

"home is where the heart is"....?
it's easy for me to answer when someone asks "where are you from?" my answer is a straight-forward, without the slightest bit of hesitation- Hong Kong. Born, bred and proud to be from Hong Kong. But sometimes I also feel like someone who doesn't really belong anywhere.

My dad is from Hong Kong. My mum is from Taiwan. I am a British national. I went to a German school. I think in 4 languages.. and find it difficult to just stick to one at a time.

Sure, Hong Kong.. Taiwan.. both Chinese- what difference does it make? But for someone like me.. where in Hong Kong I get asked if I'm a foreigner and in Taiwan I get asked if I'm visiting.. for my own people to think I'm not from either place.. sometimes it does make me feel a bit lost. I guess going to an International school meant I just never really fitted in with the majority of the chinese crowd. I'm someone with multiple identities but don't really truly fit into any one of them.

Plus, now that I study in London and am considered an international student, that's one extra identity.

So what exactly would be categorized as home?

_A place where one lives; a residence.

_The physical structure within which one lives, such as a house or apartment.

_ A dwelling place together with the family or social unit that occupies it; a household.

_An environment offering security and happiness.

_ A valued place regarded as a refuge or place of origin.

_The place, such as a country or town, where one was born or has lived for a long period.

There are so many definitions of home. Being a nomad means having multiple identities, multiple homes and blending boundaries of what is perceived as home. I wouldn't really complain about being multi-cultural- it's something I feel that I'm very blessed with.

Living in a world where travelling from one country to another is simply a car ride, train ride, plane ride away; and where different cultures can be found and are transferred from one place to another, it is getting more and more common for people to feel lost about their own identities.

On average I spend around 2.5 months in Hong Kong, less than a month in Taipei and the rest of the year in London. I have a home in all 3 cities.. and I guess how I would categorize these "homes" is that one is where I grew up, one is where my family is and one is where I start to truly begin to get to know myself. All 3 places mean different things to me.. and all 3 are where my heart belongs. Being "multi-cultural" is one thing... but the feeling of "belonging nowhere" is another.

cross-stitching isn't just for nans...

Severija Incirauskaite, a lithuanian textile artist/designer uses a clever technique of mixing two very contrasting materials: metal and thread. the marriage of these two materials actually fit together perfectly in a very feminine and delicate way. once again, i'm captivated by intricate details in her pattern work.

“Way of roses is an expression about successful life. However I read it literally, eliminating figurative positive meaning from this phrase. Embroidered cars rather tell us about dangers facing on the road which are reminded to us by silent flower wreaths often standing by the roadside. The problem is still very hot – tv and newspapers are full of „war on the road“ topics everyday. Furthermore this work is a textile version of peculiar „tuning“ as functional design. That is the way I understand means by which a woman can decorate her car. It differs from widespread, commonly projecting an aggressive image autotuning of men.”

-Severija Incirauskaite

enchanted world I

there's something so captivating and enchanting about selfridges windows. after having worked with the visual merchandising team last christmas, i came to appreciate even more the work and effort that goes into these 27 windows on oxford street.

went to check out the current selfridges windows today. i would've loved to be part of their latest windows, which celebrate the opening of selfridges' shoe gallery- the world's biggest shoe department with over 4000 shoes from 150 brands!





other selfridges windows I find really inspiring:



what i truly admire about the visual display team is their incredible attention to detail. the windows team is split into 3, so each person has about 6 or 7 windows to do- which is still an incredible amount. selfridges windows have kept their reputation as not only a platform for retail and luring people into the store, but as an attraction itself. it's not just about the shopping- it's the whole selfridges experience of an enchanted world.

paper

I'm a big fan of intricate details, textures and anything touchy-feely. I love the kind of sensation of touching an intriguing piece of material. But for some reason the most simplest and basic material, one we come across everyday in our lives, I've yet to be fascinated about: paper.

Yet paper could well be one of the most versatile and available materials that allows designers to express their creativity. There are endless ways of manipulating paper to create new interesting surfaces.. folds, ruffles, paper-mâché, crumpling, cutting.

A danish fashion designer Violise Lunn creates one of a kind pieces made purely out of paper. These delicate pieces are very interesting in texture and form and shows the endless possibilities of exploring paper as a medium.



Another artist I really admire is Zoe Bradley. Her signature pieces includes gigantic flower sculptures from paper.



she also creates very sculptural dresses and fashion accessories:


Paper can be such a useful tool in a design process for exploring and prototyping, but mainly what stops me from using it is the environment. Recycled paper never feels the same as new paper.. but perhaps this means looking at paper that comes from another context- magazines, old books, flyers. And perhaps the way of bringing a new physicality to the old context would lead to new things.

dreams

We spend 1/3 of our lives sleeping. In a lifetime, an average person spends more than six years dreaming.. I've always been someone who has very vivid dreams almost every night. Sometimes they tie in very much with reality.. about something that's already happened or will be happening, and sometimes they are completely strange and surreal.

Until today, no one knows why people dream and how it actually works. But some scientists believe dreaming is a way the body stores away memories for future use. A study at Harvard medical school was made, which was carried out on a group of amnesiacs and a group of volunteers. Throughout the study, the two groups were given computer games to play with. The results showed that the amnesiacs dreamt of Tetris, even when they don't actually remember playing it. The next day, they were asked to play Tetris again. They couldn't recall ever playing this game and unlike the other control group, their skills did not improve. Dr Robert Stickgold, a psychiatrist at Harvard Medical School, who conducted the research, said he believed that the brain used dreams as a way of filing away memories from the previous day.



When dreams seemed weird, it could be because the brain was trying to cross-reference new against old memories. Joe Griffin, author of "Dreaming Reality" says "dreams are nature's way of dissolving any emotional arousal left in our brains before we go to sleep... The reasons dreams are so hard to explain is that the dream switches off the arousal, so that the emotion it is based on becomes tucked away at the back of your mind.. That's why you can't work it out in the morning - the whole purpose of the dream is to make you forget that emotion."

Joe also adds: "The original concern that caused a dream might not be immediately obvious because it will have been translated using appropriate metaphors drawn from our own memories. This is why, even if you sense a dream is about a particular person, they won't appear like they do in real life. They will be metaphorically translated into someone or even something else, or a distorted version of themselves. Michael Schumacher, for instance, might appear as a grand prix car."

a love affair with shoes

stilettos, wedges, platforms, kitten heels. what is this whole shoe obsession phenomenon with women?


As like all little girls, shoe-obsession started pretty much at the moment I learnt how to crawl. I was trying on my mum's ferragamo's and gucci's and longed for the day I could have my very own pair of high heels. My love for shoes however died down as training for Ballet meant I was wearing ballet shoes all the time anyway.... until a trip to Florence one summer and I walked into Salvatore Ferragamo's shoe museum.

Rows and rows of shoes inside glass boxes... I walked through the rooms in awe, taking in their intricate details, the stories of the women who once wore them.. wondering what I've been missing out on my whole life! Ferragamo designed shoes for numerous female celebrities including Audrey Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe. He understood how a woman's feet "revealed so much about her past and her personality that he was then able to create her a shoe that was both beautiful and comfortable, close to perfection"*


The shoes he created for Marilyn "intensified her innate sensuality with pointed toes and heels 11cm high, made to the same design for more than 10 years, and which were essential to her seductive sway as she walked."*


While doing research on what shoes meant to women, I stumbled upon an interesting article. The author, a shoe-a-holic herself, stated that “Cinderella’s stepsisters were not desperate for Prince Charming, they were desperate for her glass slipper”. I found this quite amusing.. and an interesting way of depicting women's love affair with shoes.

Actually, one thing that makes me feel like some kind of freak is that I love the smell of fresh new shoes.. whether they are trainers, boots, 5-inch heels. I love the feeling of removing the lid of the box and unwrapping the shoes from the crisp white paper.. there's something about that moment in the shop that you know-even when you're having an absolutely shit day.. you see those shoes lying in the box within the wrapping and suddenly you know everything is better already. But don't get me wrong... I'm not some kind of materialistic fashion victim. In fact, the longer I own a pair of shoes, the more in love I tend to be with them.

Carrie Bradshaw once said on Sex & The City "The fact is, sometimes it's really hard to walk in a single woman's shoes. That's why we need really special ones now and then to make the walk a little more fun."
The thing is, shoes are much more than just shoes in a woman's life. They are our best friends who are there with us to take on all types of adventures life has in store for us, walk us through our day to day journeys and they are the ones who carry us home at the end of all of it.

*quoted from "Salvatore Ferragmo: A love affair with shoes" 2004