Interview with Agua Chou from Agua Studio, WDC2016

We had the chance to make an interview with  Agua Chou of Taipei-based studio Agua Design, curator of the exhibition Taipei Issuuuue.



How did you become involved in Taipei Style 2? Why did you want to participate?
Taipei Style II is full of very colorful content, but it’s very different from the visual art exhibition in Taipei Style I. Taipei Style II gathers together 5 years of Taipei City Government design initiatives, totaling over 38 projects, as well as the 6 International Open Call programs and 10 Designer in Residence projects. It was a difficult exhibition to put together. We had to consider things like, what the main focus of the exhibition should be, how to combine all the different elements of the projects into a complete whole, and how to let citizens better understand the meaning of design and then invest in it. This is the main mission of Agua Design. We want to increase the pace of development in Taipei, and inject more creativity into the administrative channels. We have placed these expectations on our exhibition.





Tell us more about your public playground initiative. How did you go about putting this together/setting it up? Did you feel the process and outcome were successful?
Our project, Re-create Taipei: Overturn Taipei’s Public Parks Program, had the goal of changing the rigid mechanisms and monotony of the public parks. With the playground equipment made of water tanks and street lamps, we wanted to bring the concept of recycled materials interplay so that citizens could start to thing about different possibilities for the activation of their public spaces. The process was full of stimulating challenges, for example, we had to take a different approach to safety. Was it successful? I think the project result was better than we could have imagined. The action plan succeeded in not only forming a new public participation system and platform for the future development of our public parks, and implementing a new kind of park software, we also had a smooth interaction with the Street Lights Engineering Team, Parks and Street Lights Office of Taipei City, and discussed the transformation of the parks with local residents. In the last few months, we have realized the accumulation of ten years of thinking and preparation in practice.





What do you think the value is in an exhibition like this? Where did the idea come from?
The core of the exhibition is to inspire everyone to invest more into our living environment. Taipei has a population of 2.7 million people. We hope to make people take a fresh look at the possibilities for life in Taipei, and open up a variety of positive opportunities for participation, so that everyone can help drive forward the momentum. You can find these kind of ideas among the progressive forward-thinking street food stallholders, with every deep breath you take, you can find more inspiration. 



How would you envision the conversations you’ve set up via this exhibition continuing beyond WDC Taipei 2016?
I am a designer, I’m from Taipei, and I’m also the curator of this exhibition. As a designer, I am concerned about the creation of long-term value through design. In this case, Taipei’s urban problems are not just single cases such as public order, health, or transportation. Taipei residents enjoy quite pleasant living conditions, but there is a lack of consensus on how to invest in urban construction. In other words, there isn’t an established line of communication between the city government and the citizens. Aside from this lack of a communication channel, there is also a lack of integrated design thinking, which causes a waste of both manpower and time. Through this vibrant exhibition, Taipei Issuuuue, which explores design thinking, we hope that the direction of city development and investment can become more clear through better communication and more strategic thinking. 
Taipei Issuuuue aims to motivate every one of us to invest in this city. We hope to use design thinking to address the issues of Taipei’s construction, so that more people can understand the value that such thinking methodologies can bring. 

Christiane Bürklein

World Design Capital® 2016 – Taipei, Taiwan
IInternational Design House Exhibition, 13 – 30 October 2016
RE)-Create Taipei by Basurama until 15 October 2016
Images: Courtesy of WDC2016 Taipei
Agua Chou, Agua Design
Link: http://wdc2016.taipei/en/
Media partner: Floornature and Livegreenblog