Study Abroad: Design in Taiwan

Dear Reader, As our study abroad trip comes to a close, I sit here writing to you for the last time. This will be my last blog about Taiwan, and oh is there so much to tell you. The rest of this week has been nothing but a whirlwind, so let's get into it.  On Tuesday we had some free time to work with our NCKU group outside of the classroom. My group decided to meet at 9:30 am in the hotel lobby to have breakfast together at a cafe. We checked on our three different pomelo papers and then decided to return to the hotel and run another experiment. We found that using just the white part of the pomelo worked best, so we blended up a whole bunch and made a big sheet of pomelo paper, leaving it to dry in the sun. We also tested out mixing the pulp with rice glue and forming it directly over a bowl—this one didn't work super well, it was brittle. After running our material experiment, we still had to figure out what form we were going to make out of the paper, so we spend the rest o

Dear Reader, This is the start of our last week in Taiwan. I can't believe it's already been two weeks. It feels like the time has flown by.  Saturday was a great day out in nature. First, we went on a wetland boat trip in Taijiang, then we took a tour of Anping Old Street, and then we explored Anping Tree House. While it was rainy our whole boat ride, it was super fun to see all the different aspects of the wetland, such as the mangroves, the different egrets, and the different fishing methods. The tour guides even let us hold some of the fish caught with one of the raft nets. While exploring Anping, I really enjoyed learning about how the tree house was originally an abandoned factory building, but then the government decided that they wanted to make something beautiful out of it to enrich the area with change and bring a new style to the old. On Saturday night a group of us went to Reverb Bar, which had a mock elevator door as their entrance, and had a few cocktails before h

Dear Reader, We are nearing the end of our second week in Taiwan, and what a time it has been.  On Wednesday we traveled from Tainan through Jhushan to Nanto to learn about tea, woodworking, and bamboo crafting. Our first stop was the Yoshan Tea Culture Musuem where we learned about the different types of tea, the tea harvesting process, and also got to make our own tea balls. It was interesting to see the techniques that they used to process the tea and also how the tea master checked all the flavors of the tea with a special tea set. I really liked seeing the different tea sets and was amazed to find out that they use different color tea sets to serve tea in different seasons. We also got to try tea at the museum, my favorite was the Roasted Dong Ding Oolong Tea. I really enjoyed the flavor of it and was pleasantly surprised by the fruitful essence it left behind in the empty cup. After the museum, we went to a Taiwanese restaurant where we ate family style. The restaurant had a some

Dear Reader,  I hope this letter finds you well. This week has been off to a good start. We left Taipei on Saturday and took the HSRT to Tainan. The train ride was quite long, but I enjoyed looking out the window at the scenery passing by. After checking into the hotel, we went to meet the NCKU students and take a tour of their campus. I didn't realize how big their university was. The banyan grove was beautiful, but they looked different than the ones that we have in Hawaii. The ones that we have at home have bigger leaves than the ones here, which made me think about how even though we have similar climates there's still a uniqueness to each place that make it especially its own. Also on another note, I can't believe they have an entire building dedicated to their industrial design program. There were so many different student posters and prototypes in the hallways. I found the prototype especially impressive. They were so realistic and precise looking that they seemed li

Dear reader,  The rest of this week was a ceramic lover's dream, and I think the rest of this week has been my favorite part of the trip so far!  On Wednesday we went to Yingge, a town famously known for its ceramics, and visited the ceramics museum and tai-hwa pottery factory. We also went to dot design, where we saw how they used reused materials to make many design pieces.  In the museum, it was interesting to see all the different uses of pottery from the past and the examples of its potential uses for the future. My favorite pieces were the traditional ceramic brick windows and their patterning, the porcelain wall socket covers, and the tea sets. I also learned about the effects of reduction vs oxidation firing on different clay bodies and how it can change their color properties. For example, porcelain becomes whiter and brighter in an oxidation firing whereas the reduction firing brings out a more speckled look.  At the Tai-hwa pottery factory, we got to take a tour and pain

Dear reader, Welcome to my first travel blog! To introduce myself quickly, I’m Kayla, a current senior studying industrial design at the University of Washington. I am writing to you from Taipei, Taiwan where I’m studying abroad for the next few weeks. Through this blog, I hope to chronicle my adventures, thoughts, and experiences as I learn more about Taiwanese culture, meet new people, experience new things, and renew my passion for design.  It’s only been three days since this study abroad program started, but I feel like I’ve already gotten to experience so much. On the first day here our study abroad group had dinner at a local restaurant near our hotel. Over a 7-8 course meal, served family style, we got to know each other more and talked about the things we were most excited about seeing or experiencing on the trip. That night our group also went to check out the Shilin night market and while I didn’t buy anything then, our group went back the next day and I got some grape tangh