The NZ Studies Network conference aims to examine the ‘making of New Zealanders’ in the past, present and future. It will focus on New Zealand and its many different cultures, exploring their origins, historical sources and influences, contemporary changes and future developments. It aims to embrace as many as possible of the disciplinary fields within the humanities, social sciences and the natural sciences. It is anticipated that the cultures that will be explored will include not only the more obvious national, ethnic and religious ones, but the practices and mindsets of governmental, professional, business, educational, religious and sporting subcultures, and of cultures found in other daily occupations and interests, such as eating, drinking and entertainment. Dean Sully, Rosanna Raymond and Anthony Hoete have collaborated on the conservation of Hinemihi for the past five years, currently as ‘komiti’ members of Te Maru O Hinemihi (In the embrace of Hinemihi) and previously on the National Trust Steering committee of the Hinemihi Project. Together they offer three differing perspectives: a British Conservator, a Polynesian Artist and a (Maori) Architect triangulate our understanding of Hinemihi’s reciprocal relationships with her people. (Web health warning: Health and Safety Britain recommend that a net flash rate for a bank of strobe lights does not exceed 5 flashes per second, at which only 5% of photosensitive epileptics are at risk. It also recommends that no strobing effect continue for more than 30 seconds, due to the potential for discomfort and disorientation.)

The Torre Valesca by BBPR is part of the first generation of Italian modern architecture, while still being part of the Milanese context in which it was born, to which also belongs the Milan cathedral and the Sforzesco Castle. The tower, approximately 100 metres tall, has a peculiar and characteristic mushroom-like shape. The tower recalls the Lombard tradition of medieval fortresses and towers. In such fortresses, the lower parts were always narrower, while the higher parts propped up by wooden boards or stone beams. Planning laws required that the various programmes within the tower – mixed functions of residential and commercial use – be expressed volumetrically. A by-product of the mushroom morphology is the urban panorama which an enlarged top floor plate allows. The tower / signal box as an urban periscope? What expanded views might be afforded over Shoreditch?  The overlooking of the adjacent park (Allen Gardens) could be enhanced as unnatural surveillance. Or a view to Christ Church framed by a window of steepled proportions?

Given the complexity of designing cities, master planning sometimes appears as the reduction of urbanism to a level of pattern making, programming, land-use planning. Parametric or otherwise. Abstraction itself is useful in giving an overview. Whilst considering the pattern of cities and ‘patter nation’ as visual means to analyse foreign countries, we wondered if the boubou patterns of West Africa as we see so often here in our office based in central East London (down the road from Dalston, across the river from Peckham…) operate as a means to understanding the divergent aesthetic of urban texture: the fabric of a West African city site composed as Boubou. After all, boubou is a wax printed cloth produced in that Euro-nation today upheld as a model of sustainable urbanism: Holland. In the best pattern-nation urban fabric tradition, WHAT_architecture started imagining the Freetown imprint. Modelled by Nde, photographed by Pablo.

Come predict the future of contemporary of chinese art. Forecast: who will be the most popular artist? But is the Fortune Cookie really Chinese – or does it even matter if the ideological association is strong enough? SuperDry is perceived of as a Japanese product but is actually a British manufacturer that combines vintage Americana fabrics with pseudo-Japanese text. Fire Works? Exhibition re-opens November 5th. Drawing by sparkler photographic workshops. Chinese lantern skies. 8? new chinese artists will inspire you to create your own artistic 8! creations. Will it be a double vision of London Eye as a number eight, a double Big Ben…