London Fashion Week: Osman

Promising to evoke the dusty grandeur of Indian palaces, echoing maharajas and maharanis, the glossy white runway of Bloomsbury Ballroom was set for some East-West fusion. The result was surprisingly light and ...

Lacoste SS14

It was all about the hard lines of the tennis court for Felipe Oliveira Baptista’s SS14 Lacoste collection – it began with the contrast piping that navigated its way over the block colours, this gradually got b...
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Finest China

Forged by the flames of Chinese kilns, porcelain (also called “china ”, “fine china” or “chinaware”), has been collected and revered for centuries. Translucent when held up to the light, strong and emitting a r...
Li Bingbing. Photograph: Anders Brogaard. Dress, necklace and earrings by Gucci

Life is beautiful

Frankly speaking, interviewing someone famous is always a challenge. It is hard to get something new, deep or meaningful when they have had so many experiences but too little time, and perhaps little inclin...

We shall meld

Evolving from the Slow Food movement, which originated in Italy in the 1980s when a group of people resisted the opening of a McDonald’s in a small town, the phrase “Slow Life” describes a way of living that ...

Rethinking China

“Study the past if you would define the future” – Confucius (551 – 479 BC) Modern China adores education. Learning for Chinese students constitutes an immemorial praxis of the highest cultural value. ...

Chen Man

What images does the city called Beijing call forth in our minds? Perhaps we would see the grandeur of the Forbidden City, or the sleek modernity of the CCTV headquarters. Maybe old memories of the hutongs ...

(Extra)ordinary Yung Ho Chang

According to Philip Tinari, a leading curator of art and architecture in China, Yung Ho Chang can be referred to as “a pioneer of contemporary Chinese architecture“. This epithet refers to the historical sign...

In fine feather

For birds, feathers serve three main functions, to fly, keep warm and to attract their partners. But for Kate MccGwire they serve a very different function – art. Since her graduation from the Royal College o...

The new Noah’s Ark

Since the dawn of civilisation, capturing animals has been a common practice. At first, human beings were motivated by pure basic instinct – the need to survive – seeking food and protection. Subsequently c...

The Art of Writing

Long before characters were created, the ancient Chinese made different knots on ropes in order to record information. But ropes might easily be burnt and information lost, and as life gradually became more...