Design Tour
During this Friday morning we divided ourself in 4 groups, attempting to explore different places about art and design.
HKDI
A part of us went to the HKDI (Hong Kong University of Design), Where Berenice, was teacher during the last fall semester and Hélène will be during the next one.
The bank of material made our industrial designer really crazy face to the profusion and the diversity of shapes and materials.
Also the size of the school is gigantic, for going inside you must take the biggest elevator of Hong Kong!
M+
A group went to west Kowloon, the cultural district, for visiting M+, a museum of contemporary art.
The current exhibition was delightful and the park near the museum show them a lot of possibilities for open-air performances and cultural events.
Dim Sum Labs
Other were going to visit Dim Sum Labs, an hacker-space in the hearth of the city.
That was breathable to have a break from people who are making a serious product and money with IOT (internet of things) and meeting peoples who do that for their pleasure, as they say: “to mess around with [anything] for fun”.
Poly-u university
The last group went to the Poly-u university for the exhibition of Diplomas of the art school department.
Their building is one of the last creation of Zaha Hadid, the light inside is very natural due to the pyramidal construction of floors, this is something really rare in Hong Kong said our guide.
The students projects were quite inspiring, reminding us our proper school with a little more corporate direction.
With this tour we could observe the cultural aspect of Hong Kong, and that seems quite fresh but ambitious due to the new-borns buildings that we visit, the dynamic structures and the strong cultural program inside.
Forbo
After a quick lunch for most of us, we came in offices of Forbo, a Swiss company that make floor and pvc belt.
After they present us their company, we discuss about the central position of Hong Kong for doing business, the value of being a Swiss company, and also the environment of HK & China.
Hong Kong is a profitable place for foreigner company, firstly, it is really dynamic, and also a direct access to the asian market and especially for China.
But dealing with China mean being adapted to Chinese rules, and management in China and in the rest of the world are two different things.
MakerHive
The coworking space MakerHive hosted us Friday evening, giving us the possibility to present our projects one more time. About 20 people attended the event, making it an excellent opportunity for us to gather feedback about the projects. This was particularly interesting given the broad spectrum of background of the attendees.
The elevator pitches went very well and remarkable improvement could be seen with respect to the previous ones. This shows the result of the hard work done by the teams during the last couple of days to refine the pitches, by incorporating the feedback received so far, and practice their delivery.
For the first time, the majority of the public was from either Hong Kong or Mainland China, which gave us very interesting insight about the Asian market. Through the feedback, teams could understand how and why their product could be appealing to the local customer. Additionally, teams could realize how cultural difference strongly influence the way the pitch is perceived. These two aspects are vital, because they show how the knowledge of the target culture is not only essential to carry out a market study, but also to be able to choose the right words, images and expressions that allow to reach out to the public in the desired way.
Tobia & Thomas