Pearl Lam (林明珠): Hello, this is Pearl Lam Podcast. I’m sitting here in LA with the famous Kulapat, who has been doing architecture, design and all around the world. So, Kulapat, can you just give a very brief about yourself to the audience who may not be in the area of architecture and design?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Thank you, Pearl. So I was born in Thailand and then spent 15 years in Japan. I studied there Masters and PhD and then worked closely with my mentor, Tadao Ando in Osaka for eight years, which I worked with him on so many projects around the world before I decided that I need to start my own. So I moved to the US in 2004 and set up my studios in Los Angeles first and then New York. So this year is actually our 20th anniversary of our studio called wHY. And fortunately, we work. We based in these two cities, but we work mostly globally. And now majority of our work is actually in Asia, in Europe and in the Middle east. And we are trying to ramp up our work in America as well. But for some reason, the work in the culture art section is happening so much outside as well. So thank you and happy to be here.

Pearl Lam (林明珠): Kulapat, since when do you know that you, you wanted to study architecture?

Kulapat Yantrasast : Around six years old.

Pearl Lam (林明珠): Six years old!

Kulapat Yantrasast: Why? You look at me like, I did not know. I did not know. But I knew that was kind of because, you know, I was taken to Paris when I was six. But then. So that’s the first part of it. The second part, when I was seven years old, we didn’t go anywhere because we normally go somewhere, someplace. We stayed home because our house was undergoing renovation. Right? And I was there in my room, like the size of this room, a bit bigger, and I was told by my parents that, oh, we’re going to do renovation. I was like, I know, I know, I know. I saw in my room, in my bed, and all of a sudden that wall, because I was like, sleeping late I didn’t want to go, and they all started working. I just ignored them. I was like, the whole wall was removed. And so I was like, what is that? And then all of a sudden, you see the mango trees on the other side. It’s like, what? Like, when you’re a child, you just kind of adapt to the space you’re given to, right? I was lucky to have my own bedroom, but I was like, what? That wall was just removed? And I was like, whoa, what is that? And then my father, who was an engineer, he’s retired, was like, oh, since you’re here not having anything to do, why don’t you just follow the workers and pick up the nails, and at the end of the day, you can collect them and sell it back to me. So because I didn’t have anything to do, I was such a bother at home, I guess. So I was just following them and collecting these nails and things and sometimes help them clean up and think of Chinese style, right? And then I do that and I collect that and start hanging out with them. And there’s like, oh, give me a hammer. Oh, give me a hammer of that. And sometimes they just like, oh, give me nail to sell it to my father. And so I was kind of like, maybe for two months, I was, like, hanging out with the crew. And so I liked the idea. Like, oh, at least I kind of know. I didn’t know what architect was, but I was like, oh, this is how you build things. Including my own bedroom, too. So I felt like, oh, I get it. And so it gave me a little bit of a sense of power that you can actually make your own environment. Right? I mean, when you’re a child, we forgot how we felt so helpless as a child, because you’re so dependent on your parents, you’re so dependent on where you go, what to eat, or whatever, right? But when building things, that’s why I think kids like toolbox.

Pearl Lam (林明珠): Yeah.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Because they can kind of put this thing up because they feel like they’re in power of something. And in that note, based on that renovation, it gave me the sense like, oh, I can do this. I can kind of be part of this.

Pearl Lam (林明珠): So from seven years old, you wanted to build buildings.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I thought. I mean, that was deep into my DNA. But I was such a good student, and so my mother and her clan was like, doctor, doctor, doctor, doctor. I was about to become a doctor until I got into college. About to. And the night before I have to put in the exam, late at night, I knock on my parents door and say, I don’t want to be a doctor. I almost crying. It’s like, I don’t want to be a doctor. I want to become an architect. But I was such a good student. So everyone said, oh, we need a doctor in a family.

Pearl Lam (林明珠): Typical, typical Chinese family. We need a doctor, we need an accountant. You have to study that.

Kulapat Yantrasast (林明珠): Because I was able to, because I was such a good student, I always loved to study. And then they let me become a nurse architect. So between seven and let’s say 17, I was not, I didn’t even think about architecture at all. I was grooming myself to please my mother. Expectation to become a doctor. So then at that point, it was a turning point, because I felt like, I cannot do this. I need to do something else. And I saw them two weeks ago. They were just kind of laughing at me.

Pearl Lam: They must be so proud of you now.

Kulapat Yantrasast: They were not sure, because I play along with them, right? I play along.

Pearl Lam: I study like all Chinese children. They just play along until the very end.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah, yeah. And I think it’s funny because when I said that to them, my parents, my father said one thing, which is interesting. He said, you know, you know, we should let. I mean, he said, well, you know, he said to my mother, like, well, we have enough money, not a lot, but even if he messed up in what he wanted to do, he said a good life, so let him do what he wanted. Wow.

Pearl Lam: Wow, so understanding.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. At that time, I was like, what are you talking about? And then he turned around to me and said, well, you know, one thing is that you will never be rich because. Because as an architect, you’re selling service.

Pearl Lam: Oh, no. Norman Foster is very rich.

Kulapat Yantrasast: That’s true. That’s true. And there are a lot of them. There are ways to do it in general, but there’s one out of a million. Right. But, yeah, I think, you know, going back to what we said before about challenge, right. Perhaps we would not be able to do what we do today if we were not challenged by our parents or the previous generation. And again, you know, it’s different, because in Asia, we were not trained, like in the West, that you have to kill your father to be yourself, which is such a Western way of thinking. In Asia, we just moved the needle a little bit. We just, like, evolved.

Pearl Lam: And. But I always say to some of my friends who are parents now, I said, the biggest problem I feel in the West and the East culture, the same thing. We never teach children to be themselves and to love themselves because we always, you know, in West, they always have a hero worship. Oh, you have to be like this. You have to better. I mean, none of the children, none of all my contemporaries or my, all my friends children even of this age would say to the little girls or little boys, say, you know, it’s really important to know who you are. And until you know who you are, you don’t have the strength. And then you have to love who you are. Then you become someone we never thought about.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I think you touched on such an important point. You know, loneliness is the biggest disease now among young people, right? Because it feels like with social network and other things supposed to connect people. Not really. People feel alone and feel so.

Pearl Lam: But you see, if you love loving yourself, you love to spend time with yourself, and therefore you will never have such problems.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I agree. I think we pitch people against each other. Look at, look at, look at him. He does so much better. Like him or this and that, right?

Pearl Lam: I always won and wanted to ask you, okay, you are Thai, you study architecture in Thailand. Why choose Japan? Why Japan? Because Thai architecture and Japanese architecture is, you know, Japanese is always very quiet, very meditative. Thai is very ornamental. So how did you from Thai going to Japan?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Thank you. When I was in Japan, you know, I was really wondering and almost obsessing about what should contemporary Thai architecture be. Right. We see something that look like a copy from the past.

Pearl Lam: Absolutely.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Or we have a copy from the West. Right. So we don’t have that DNA evolve. Right. And so, and then I realized that we can’t really learn from the west because the West have different problems. The west create amazing modern culture, modern architecture like Le Corbusier that you mentioned. But they have different problems completely. The problems that we have is how we really endure and sustain and thrive with our tradition, but integrated with the modern culture, modern life. And so I was like, oh, I cannot really learn from Europe or America. I have to learn from people in our same situation. So I start looking at Japan, I start looking at Mexico, I start looking at Brazil. Because these places have, you know.

Pearl Lam: Yes.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Oscar Niemayer, Tange and Ito. Right. And so then I was like, yeah, I need to look at these places. And even though, as you say, Japan is so minimal and Thailand is so maximal. Right? But there’s a sense of Asian culture, Buddhism, we eat rice. So the whole sense about it and proportion. Yeah. And so I was fascinated by that. So, okay, I’m gonna go to Japan. So that was my destiny.

Pearl Lam: And to work in Tadao Endo. I was always told that Tadao Ando is very one of the. I met one of the architect who used to work for him. He said he would use the fingers, a pencil to. To beat the head. He’s very tough.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I was told he’s very physical. I mean, I work very closely with him for eight years. Right. And it’s my first and only job. I never work for anyone else, so I don’t have anything to compare. But I think he’s very focused and very determined for his path. So that passion and that dedication is definitely admirable. Right, so that’s one. He’s also very physical because he used to be a boxer.

Pearl Lam: Oh, really?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yes, he used to be a boxer. So I think that might be some of that. I mean, I joined him 1996, 2003, and maybe less than what he known to do that. But he’s still very intense. He’s a very intense person. And that’s why the work talked about this intensity. The work taught about this spirituality that is involved. But one thing I can tell you that he really walked the talk. He talked about spirits. He talked about the light and the philosophy and his work, when you see it, it speaks of those concepts as well.

Pearl Lam: Yeah. Because once I was in Osaka, I took a guide to go and look at all the endless building. And there was one building I still remember, it was a Buddhist temple, and underneath a lotus pond, I. And it’s fascinating.

Kulapat Yantrasast: That’s one of my favorite work also.

Pearl Lam: I mean, fascinating. Really fascinating. It’s not big, but it’s more. But that intensity just makes you. Makes me scream.

Kulapat Yantrasast: You’re absolutely right. And in this case, it’s quite fascinating because as an experience, it’s so beautiful and inspiring. But in this very minimalist gesture, it will have the context of Buddhism. Right. Which is about lotus and about going down into yourself like a lotus from the mud, and so rise up to the sky and bloom. So I think within that minimalist gesture, it has both the experience, which is quite meaningful, but also the philosophical context. Yeah.

Pearl Lam: Because when I see Ando’s building, it is the volume. And that’s why it’s fantastic when he built museum. So I can see how, you know, all the galleries and all the museum once could have packed you to design, because to understand volume is not many architects who, you know, the simplicity of this volume to put the artwork is special.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Thank you. I love that. But, you know, but to be honest, the reason why ISO left Japan is because I felt, you know, after 15 years in Japan, that it is so beautiful and unique, but it’s like its own isolated world. It’s so isolated. Right. And I felt like, you know, my Thai roots were showing. I start to kind of want diversity, richness, smell and other senses. I felt that in Japan, that’s less. So I continued to really be in love with it.

Pearl Lam: But still, yeah, it’s really homogeneous.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Very much so. You’re absolutely right. And I felt that, you know, in a weird way, it seems like there’s only one game in town, right? But they’re doing that game so well. But for someone who’s not from there, I felt like I learned a lot from that. I want to really connect this to the world as well. It’s like that kind of sense of. Because I’m a. So, you know, from the south, right. Thailand. I also related people from hot countries like Brazil, like Mexico. I love that human aspect of it, which I maybe find less in Japan. And so I felt like America is a kind of a fertile ground for all of these to go together.

Pearl Lam: But why not Europe? Why America? I thought about that because Europe have all the traditions. And so it’s great that when you look at Europe and see how it evolved philosophically to become a contemporary architecture.

Kulapat Yantrasast: You’re absolutely right on that. You know, and before I left to start my own firm, I was working a lot in Europe, in Paris, mostly. So that was definitely my obvious options as well. But I felt, for some reason, I felt maybe at the time, Europe didn’t have a lot of opportunities for someone like me, who is an immigrant. I felt America was more open, and I felt that it’s more forgiving. I particularly love LA because I felt at the time I was 35, I was like, oh, I’m too old for New York, right? I don’t want to go and work as a slave for the city. I want to just start something. And when I come to LA, it seemed so forgiving. Like, it’s open. If you can make mistake, you can do all these things. And to be honest, you know, Frank Gehry was someone that really gave me a lot of inspiration because look at him, you know, he’s from Canada, right? And then come back here and make architecture out of chain links out of, you know, cardboard and things like that. And if you’re like, well, this is where the new vocabulary, the new language can start because no one owned it. It’s not like we have a European tradition that you have to kind of go against or go with, right. It’s something that’s kind of open. And the artist, you know, as you know so well, because you’re so, you know, connected to everyone in the light and space just gives the light and space, you know, such an inspiration aspect. And maybe because it leads me back to Japan, the sense of the essence, the sense of the emptiness and the space. Yeah.

Pearl Lam: So is this why, you know, your first office, you sat in LA or New York here?

Kulapat Yantrasast: In LA for us, yes.

Pearl Lam: Was it difficult, you know, as a new young architect, an Asian as well? How, and how. And how did you get your first project?

Kulapat Yantrasast: I guess I was lucky first. You know, I was working on a house project at the Ando office. Right. Happened to be in Malibu, which got sold to a very high price. Right. So I was. Was working on it in Osaka as Ando’s, you know, project architect and the same project when I moved here, I got to know the client quite well. So the client’s like, oh, you have to continue to work on this. So I continued to work on it in the beginning. I didn’t want to work on it because I felt like I don’t want to be attached to Ando all the time. But this is a project that means so close to my heart, because I know the client very well, I work on it from the beginning, and I felt like, oh, this is a good way of training my own staff too, because when you work on something at a very highest level in terms of construction, in terms of the expectation, it could be a beautiful thing. So we have that. But very quickly, we got our first museum, which is the Grand Rapids Art Museum, which we opened it.

Pearl Lam: You were a new architect. Even though with Tadao Ando’s experience, and connection –  to get a museum is incredible.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I think luck is definitely a big part in my life and everyone’s life. I don’t think it’s just drop on you. I think, as you said, you prepare yourself to receive opportunities, and when it comes, you can hit it, you can write, you go into it. So I felt like it’s that way because everyone is independent. What you bring to the table and what would drop on the table. I think in that case, it was fortunate because someone that I know before know that I just opened an office in Los Angeles and come knock on the door and say, we had a problem, can you come fix it for us? And I said, oh, well, should I start my career with a problem? And then I feel like maybe not. Maybe we should do something else, like from the beginning, rather than go and fix the problem. But when I went to see them, which I was not planning to take the job. I felt, oh, they need me. I can help this situation. I know how to help this situation. And so I stay on. But anyway, long story short, I was able to really made it our project and built it. In this case, it was the first LEED gold museum in America, which is also in the world. It’s the first art museum that really talked about sustainability and how you use materials, how you use energy at that time. This is 2004. It opened.

Pearl Lam: That’s very early to talk about sustainability.

Kulapat Yantrasast: And everyone was kind of afraid, like, oh, it’s going to cost more money. It’s going to make it difficult to maintain. Not really. There’s a lot of myth around that. And so we proved that to be the case. But for that reason, I decided to use concrete, which I didn’t want to, because I don’t want it to be. Exactly. Yeah. But let me tell you a quick story about Elswood Kelly, who is a very dear friend who, you know, I knew from my time at Ando. Right? So we commissioned Ellsworth to do a big piece of his sculpture in the lobby of the museum, and we went to have dinner together after. He was so shocked how big the museum is, because he always saw the little tiny model that he built. It’s like, oh, my God. I mean, and elsewhere, he’s someone that’s been so kind to me because when he moved here and he said, where are you going for Thanksgiving? And I have no idea how Thanksgiving is like, a sad time for immigrants because they all go back to their family. And so I was like, why Thanksgiving? He’s like, oh, you can come. Thanks. With us. So I’ve been going to Thanksgiving with him and Jack for many years, not.

Pearl Lam: Every year until he passed away?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Away, not knowing that that was, like, his somewhat charity towards me. Like, oh, he’s going to be alone by himself. No family here, right? But, you know, so he took me in. So we had that kind of interesting relationship. And so after his installation of his work, we went to have dinner nearby, and we all drank wine and have a great time and asked Ellsworth, like, well, Ellsworth, I really didn’t want to use concrete for this project, but I know how to do it inexpensively. I didn’t know how to do it sustainably. But do you think that people would think of this as an Ando building? And he said, no. I said, why? He said, well, you know, Ando is Japanese. He’s all about control. It’s about moving, going this way. Look, right? There’s a window, you look out, you see a tree. Everything is about control. The core of your space.

Pearl Lam: Yeah.

Kulapat Yantrasast: That’s why it’s so strong. It’s so beautiful. And he said, you’re Thai, you’re very open and you’re generous. You want people to look left and look right and look up and look down options and all of that. He said, even though it’s the same material, it’s completely different spaces. And when he said that this is true, I was like, it gave me, like, the liberations. Like, oh,

Pearl Lam: But he is really, I mean, he can see things for every. He has this clarity, which is amazing.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I was shocked about that because, of course, I only know him through his work. And when we meet, we always talk about his work. Right? We never talk about my work. And so when I asked him about my work, how articulate it is and how insightful that was, it was almost like a blessing for me. Like, yes, you can use concrete because concrete exists, you know, with Le Corbusier, with the Roman, with so many people in history of architecture. So therefore, you can use this material and do whatever with it. And if you have the DNA to do it, it will be yours.

Pearl Lam: I knew that you designed for the La Freeze, the pavilion. Right? Right. How do you come up? Because there’s so many architects. Why would they choose a Thai architect living in LA for this pavilion?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, we worked with fries LA since the beginning. Right. It was at the Paramount studio, and then we moved to Beverly Hills and now in Santa Monica for the second year. I don’t know, but I think I’m part of the art community here. And I think they like the idea that perhaps I designed some galleries. I did one for David Kardansky here, both in the LA and some others as well. But, you know, many architects design galleries, too. But I think they like the idea that I’m also kind of inclusive, that I also like to create place. You know, for me. Like, it gives me so much joy when I see people gather in my space and they’re happy to converse. So I hope that maybe that’s the reason why they do that. And this year, again, this is the second year at the Santa Monica Airport, so the tent is much larger than last year. We won space last year was flipped into two. And so we also really deployed the indoor outdoor. So there’s the whole gardens and sculpture insulation outside we have the different pavilions for food, for nonprofits and things. A lot more places for people to hang out and chill, because, yes, it is an art fair, but at the end of the day, it’s more than that. Right. We all know that we’re all here for that. The whole city, for the whole.

Pearl Lam: The socializing is really important as well. You create that space so that people can connect with each other.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Absolutely. Because I think art fair is the. It’s kind of the kitchen. Right. Or the place, but people stay. So if you decide the place that people want to look at the art and they stay, you know, gallery has a chance to be with the collectors. Collectors can be with the curators. Artists can hang out to. One thing that I’m very proud about, Frieze LA, is I go to a lot of art fairs, almost every art fair all over the world. I would say that, Fraser art Fair is the one I see the most artists. They come to see their work, they bring their friends. Right. So it’s a feel like a lot of, a lot of times artists, because.

Pearl Lam: There’S so many artists living in LA.

Kulapat Yantrasast: That’s true. But even New York artists are allergic to art fairs. They don’t want to come to the art fair because they don’t want to be seen in this kind of. Somewhat of a commercial context. Right. But it’s very healthy. You know, it depends on how you look at it, because a gallery is a commerce. Right. So I think sometimes people have this weird thinking about that. But culture and commerce always together. Always. Of course.

Pearl Lam: Of course.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Right. So I think that’s important to talk about how one support each other, one cannot survive without the other. So I feel that with Fieze art fair, we definitely try to bring it in to. And I’m proud to live here because the community is so close. The artists always show up to things, and the artists are so friendly. They want people to come to see the studio, they want to share their stories. And when an artist has an opening, all their friends are coming. It’s very supportive. It’s very supportive, exactly. Yeah.

Pearl Lam: Also, I think just now, I miss asking you, is your ArtBridge project in 2010? Can you elaborate and talk about this to the audience?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, thank you. So this ArtBridge project was the one that we started working with Judy Barker, who’s an amazing street artist who’s been celebrated so many aspects, including LACMA last year and many others. And so Judy and her team at Spark had painted this wall on the LA river, right, for the last 40 years. It’s a history of LA, from immigration, from water, from politics, from minorities. It’s on the channel of the river. And in 2004, she asked me to collaborate with her to create this bridge to cross the river, but also functioned as a platform from which you can see the walls and the river. And so I went there. This is 2004. I was excited. It was one of my first projects, too. It was a pro bono project, and it’s like, oh, my God, this is exciting. But when it went there, the river was full of trash. Full of trash? Like shopping carts, debris. I mean, you name it.

Pearl Lam: Don’t tell me. It’s like your Thai. Your Thai river. Really?

Kulapat Yantrasast: It’s very much so. But we’re coming from Japan, where I’m, like, excited about. So I was kind of shocked and angry. Like, what? How can people do this to a river? Right? Which is like, you know, in Thailand we have that, too. But I was expecting something out of. I would just move to America a few months ago. So I was like, okay, I’m going to give you back what you give to the river. You give trash to the river. I’m going to use the trash to build a bridge that you have to see every day. So you need to know that trash is you, too. Right? So I then started to think about how to build this bridge out of trash. It start from an angry, but also kind of like, okay, let’s give them what they want. And so, which is, like, weirdly American, which is consumerism and waste and stuff. And so I started looking, I was like, okay, well, how do I bridge? So I start to think about, okay, well, it’s a bridge. It needs a long span, too. Long is short. We found a way to make the railing out of shopping carts. We cut the shopping carts and make railing. The floor of the bridge is made from recycled tiles. We pick all of the small trash of the concrete. So you can see, like, old cell phones, you can see plastic, whatever it is that we embed into the concrete wall. So it’s ongoing. We finally building it after, because it was a pro bono project and we could start getting some fees to do it. And then we had to get all the donation to build the building and stuff. So it takes some time, but now finally under construction.

Pearl Lam: Wow, that’s fantastic.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I’m so. I’m so pleased about it because it is so give us, you know, the chance to work with the community to salvage the trash and clean the river and things like that.

Pearl Lam: I have one big question for you is in Japan, when they use concrete, the polished concrete, the quality of it is beautiful. It’s just perfect. I can’t see LA or any other countries can produce that, that sort of quality. So how. So how have you been dealing with this problem?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, you know, to be honest, you know, when I was working with Tadao Ando, all of the projects I work on are all overseas. And I was the only foreigner working in that office at that time.

Pearl Lam: Oh, really?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. So I was a person who fly over from one project to the other, working with the Italians, working with the French, working with the British, working with the Chinese, working with Americans to know to do the best concrete. But what we were doing was not to try to import or export Japanese concrete. We try to go to each place and try to cook the best out of that ingredients. So when you go to Italy, right, I mean, the sand, the stone, the cement is so different. Completely different. It’s a culture. It’s like cooking, right? You can try to cook the same dish, like fried rice, but with a different ingredient. It’s so different. The rice is different, the oil is different. So therefore, it’s really quite fun. And so you have to go in a place of respect. You have to first know what they do, right? And there’s like, oh, well, let’s elevate the quality. Let’s make it consistent. Let’s make the color clear. Let’s bring the detail.

Pearl Lam: I never knew that because I always. This is my biggest question, right? I always have this question. So you don’t go. You go to Naoshima, right? Every single of these buildings, you touch the concrete. It’s smooth and it’s beautiful. And the floor never have a crack, and it’s beautiful. So I go back to Hong Kong, I go to New York. Concrete is really different. But if you are using concrete as a material to build your building, that’s what I always wanted to ask. How do you control it? But with your explanation, it’s great.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Concrete is so human. It’s great because the ingredient is so simple and it really, the labor. What I liked about concrete is that it doesn’t bullshit like it is what it is. If you didn’t do a good job with the form, if you didn’t do a good job with the mix, it shows there’s no decoration, there’s no hiding, there’s no molding, right? So it’s really come down to the carpentry of the workshop, the mix and the choreography of the poor. So I think that, you know, and if I go around the world, I know exactly where. Like Italy concrete. Like, if you see from the work that I do with Franco Pinot at the Dogana, the Punta della dogana, that’s a beautiful, excellent concrete, right? If you go to the house in Malibu that we did. That’s another very different concrete, but so excellent as well.

Pearl Lam: So every time when you do a project, let’s say that you do a project here. So all the concrete you use is from one manufacturer that you use. And then.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Not at all. Not at all, not at all, not at all. Every time it’s different. If you would do a work in even in Malibu or let’s say in Palm Springs, right. It depends on who are the closest supplier of cement, of sand, of aggregates. You cook it together almost like you talk to the general contractor. How you do that, you create mock ups. And the most important thing about concrete is consistency. Yeah, because you want it to be. Let’s say you have a wall which is 100ft long, 200ft long. You want it to feel one piece. You don’t want to see this checkerbox or something a problem. Right. So no matter what color it is, it’s about the intention and the quality control that go into it. So we focus on that. And I think that it’s a lot of training, but it has to start with a place of respect, that we have to start respecting the workers. But then it’s like being a coach. You respect your players, but you elevate the players to where they were normally to put a better place.

Pearl Lam: So, okay, your clients, when you first arrived there, I don’t think that many of your clients will understand concrete structure or concrete building. Because you arrived like 2004, 2005, five now is very common. Right? Before, when you first came here, when you start designing projects, I mean, does people say to you, hey, we don’t want this. We want a little bit more glamorous. We’re Hollywood.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, interesting. Yeah, you’re right. But I think, you know, people, you know, the best clients are the curious clients. Yeah, right. If they know what they want, they can go out and build it. And some people might think so. But once we develop a sense of trust, once we go to see things together. And I’m also very. Because I also love art. So I talk a lot about art. I talked a lot about things. And when we start to know each other, go to the places. And of course, you know, Kranz always compared himself to their friends and other collectors and other people, right? So they want a unique moment. And so you can also kind of like, yes, but what is about you? Like, it’s unique because of who you are. It’s so unique because it doesn’t look like someone else. And so with that trust, we start to build this understanding of the sense of who they are. I mean architecture is the business of branding, right? It’s a business of image making, of identity, you know, so I mean the good ones, right? And that’s why architecture always use for politics, for anything, right? So within that kind of possibility, you know, you have the chance of really working with your client to build something which is extremely unique.

Pearl Lam: I mean unless you have. I mean you always built the best building. If you have a very demanding. How would I say demanding developer.

Kulapat Yantrasast: That’s true. I think it’s like a collaboration.

Pearl Lam: Yeah, it’s a collaboration.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I think both should challenge each other. I think, you know, like Frank Israel, an architect who passed always talked about himself as he’s the shadow of the client or the project is a shadow of the client. Like, like there’s some cases where architecture exists with our clients, right? That you just create this. This thing and it just happened and it’s beautiful and it might be timeless. There’s a lot of cases where you like for example like the Menil Collection in Houston which is counted as one of the best museums in America. Renzo Piano was quite young, right? In the beginning. De Minnillo was planned to work with Lu Kahn, but he passed away, right. And so Renzo was the person. And with Lorenzo, together with Misses de Manil, that was the.

Pearl Lam: They created a monument.

Kulapat Yantrasast: And I think that that still not 100%. But that’s one main way of creating good masterpieces is that trust but also challenge.

Pearl Lam: You have to challenge because if we challenge you push the boundaries.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Otherwise everyone get into too much of a comfortable. Exactly.

Pearl Lam: So among all the buildings that you’ve built, which is your best project, you consider as your best project?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Wow, that’s a tough question.

Pearl Lam: Yeah. Name me three. Name me three.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, I think it’s always the first project which is the Grand Rapids Art Museum. Right. It’s something that of course is the first baby. Yeah, right. And we went through so much within the last. Within three years that I told my staff like if you survive all this together, you guys, you guys gonna learn too much out of this. It’s like that. So that’s always the case. And my own house, which is a tiny little house,

Pearl Lam: can you invite me there please?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Of course, of course. And it’s weird because I’m like the last architect who want to design my own house. I’m the last photographer because I felt that I should be doing this for other people. Maybe because I was concerned. It’s like photographer taking their own self portrait. Why are you doing that? There are artists who like to do their own self portrait, and there are artists who never do that. They always do portrait of other people. So I’m like the second type. And so when the time comes, when I feel like I need a place, I keep looking and looking and looking, and it’s like, oh, God, I cannot afford this. This is not good enough, blah, blah, blah. So in the end, it’s like, okay, I have to do my own. And so that process of building my own house really allowed me to understand even more. I put myself in the shoes of the client. I understand how to think about the anxiety of building something, not just only finance, but who are you? Right. You know, many things. That definitely is a meaningful thing. For sure. Would you give me a last one? Even though I’m an architect, I’m such a sucker for gardens and trees. I think for me it is the ultimate art form.

Pearl Lam: Don’t you like those Kyoto sand, sand garden? I just love those sand gardens and…

Kulapat Yantrasast: How they teach us so much about, you know, how to live on earth, your nature. You’re part of nature, but you’re not. You also have your own consciousness and being right. So within that, we designed a garden/pavilion in Scotland for the Ross Pavilion, which is right in middle of Edinburgh, right under the castle. So that I was so pleased with it because it really integrates landscape and architecture into one. You don’t really know where architecture ends and where gardens start. It become one thing. And when I look back at it, I mean, we won a competition seven years ago. When I look back at it, there’s nothing I want to change about it. You know, it doesn’t mean it’s fantastic. Oh, that’s fixed.

Pearl Lam: That’s great.

Kulapat Yantrasast: But it also gives a lot of, like, the overall concept. It’s easy, right? Not easy, but it’s kind of defined. And within that, the botanist can do something they want. It’s not going to change anything. So it welcome. It’s kind of defined, but also open ended that other people can do work on it, too. So I kind of like that notion. Yeah.

Pearl Lam: Okay, so next thing is you’ve been here for now 20 years. I mean, so you start with LA, then you move to. When do you open your…

Kulapat Yantrasast: New York is built around 14 years ago. So l. A is 20, New York is 14. New York is now a bigger office. You know, we’re doing a wing at the MET called the Rockefeller Wing, which we won this selection or six years ago. It’s actually open next spring 2021.

Pearl Lam: Wow. That’s fantastic.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. And it’s something that I’m so excited about, not because yet it’s another museum, but I felt that. But in this time, museums, what I call are sites of empathy. Right. Like, it’s when I designed the Rockefeller Wing, which is collection of Africa’s Oceanias and art from the Americas.

Pearl Lam: Oh, I know which. The oceanic.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. So I’m not just dealing with New Yorkers. Right. I remember myself as a Thai boy, you know, went to see the Louvre for the first time and see Egyptian Art. Right. Or African art. Right. So these places are not just for local people. Right. Like, I can imagine a Chinese boy going to the Met for the first time and see African art. So it’s my job to make sure that they like each other. The sense of, you know, understanding. And I think in a world now that we are so full of conflicts and hate and misunderstanding of each other. Right. I think it’s sadly come down to food and art.

Pearl Lam: Yeah, I think so. This is culture, right. This is what we call about culture. And culture is really important.

Kulapat Yantrasast: And it’s so it’s invisible, but it’s needed. It’s that glue that allowed. Like, for example, I mean, weirdly, like, my father’s Chinese, my mother’s Thai. My mother did not like anything at all Chinese, except Chinese food. Right. And she doesn’t like Chinese rituals. She doesn’t like Chinese decorations or anything like that at all when we come to Chinese food, her passion. So I think that food and art has this, like, really undeniable power to bring people together. Like, we try to kind of slap each other with our doctrines and our. You know, you need to understand me. I’m here first and whatever. Right. But I think if you can solves the soft things with, like, food and art, which you do so well with.

Pearl Lam: Your soft culture, with your part.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Exactly.

Pearl Lam: Soft power. And this is things that you can bring people together, which I think is absolutely right, is really important, especially food. I mean, it’s so easy. You can just invite people. They sit together, they eat, and then they start talking with each other.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. Yeah.

Pearl Lam: Next big question is, I was told that you are designing the Lucas Museum, which will open in 2025.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yes.

Pearl Lam: So tell me, what are they housing? Are they doing an immersive.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, okay. We did not design the building. The building is from Mad Architects from Beijing. We designed the scenography and the musicography of the show with George and his team. Yes. So just making. I think it’s an interesting opportunity is because the job came to us after we designed the Academy Museum, which is the Oscar Museum next to LACMA.

Pearl Lam: Yeah, this is the one that Dominic.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Exactly. Is the chair of the power behind everything. Again, we are so unique architect because we work with other architects, right? We talked about in the Lucas museum, Matt architecture. He is the architect of the building. We do the stenography and all the gallery design at the Academy Museum, Renzo Piano is the one who renovated the building. Used to be a department store. Right. He add the theater to it. We do all the gallery design and sonography. So back to our Lucas Museum. I think it’s a very unique opportunity because this is not. He’s a collector, but he is a creative collector, right. He see himself in the light of the creative history of the world, you know, from the Egypt to the Mayan to. And you can see, you know, like Star Wars is a lot of inspire from Egypt and Tunisia.

Pearl Lam: Yes, yes.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Right. Raiders of the Lost Ark is Mayan Civilizations and the Aztec. And so he really wanted this story to continue to inspire the young people today. Like, the storytelling is as old as time.

Pearl Lam: But it’s very difficult because if you go to a movie, it’s moving pictures and moving images. But if you do a Lucas Museum, everything is still right. So how can you capture that attention?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Good question. Good question. And even though that’s the case, he also didn’t want too much of the fuzziness, like the gadgets and things. Because what I understand, what he wants is he want people to unfeel what art does not what art looked like, what art does, what art does to you, what art could do to you, which is to inspire you to be a storyteller, too, to inspire you to do something, to think differently, to express yourself or to understand your line of history, because that’s what it did to him. It did to him when he saw all this amazing work from thousands and thousands of years ago down to even recent work. So our test is like, how do you tell that story of almost like a chain reaction of inspiration? Like, this person inspired that person to make this work and then this happened. So it’s all that. So I think that it would be a creativity museum, basically.

Pearl Lam: So how big is this museum?

Kulapat Yantrasast: It’s quite big. I think the main gallery is on one floor, which I think is around close to 75,000 sqft.

Pearl Lam: But you have to design the whole scenography.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. The gallery is on the first floor, the fourth floor and the fifth floor. But the main is the fourth floor, which is all the story not just about his work and his collection, but many other things.

Pearl Lam: So this is the fun part. Designing it would be.

Kulapat Yantrasast: And, you know, like. And in some place we include new technology because it has immersive experience, you know, video mapping, projection mapping, even hologram.

Pearl Lam: Even hologram,

Kulapat Yantrasast: So to all, to really bring all technology, but not for people to worship technology for technology sake, but to really render the story, because, for example, you know, like, okay, you want to talk about Egyptian art in a context. You might have a small photograph of the pyramid next to it. Yes, it gives you the context, but does it move you? It doesn’t. Right? But if you have a big projection mapping of the pyramid next to it, now you start telling the story, right? If you see a hologram of the Venus of Ellendorf, which is in Austria, never going to leave Austria. But how you talked about that work in relation to the other work, you can put like a little photograph next to it. But yes, it’s like a textbook, right? But how you do that to get people’s like, whoa, whoa.

Pearl Lam: But hold on. First, don’t you think that the way that you are designing the museum, we are talking now, number one, this is a digital age of a different museum. Number two, you are actually giving a complete different experience in order to capture the Gen Z attention, because Gen Z is. Attention span is very short. So with that, you are capturing it and growing that younger audience, which is missing in most of the museum.

Kulapat Yantrasast: You. Absolutely right. But technology work for everyone. Right? Meaning that it’s storytelling at the highest level because you’re using all of the tools you can get. The problem with museum, too, is that museum, as we know today, is a product of colonization.

Pearl Lam: Of course, it is a Western. I mean, going to museum, even going to galleries, the whole infrastructure is Western. I mean, our Asians, we don’t have that because Asians, and I don’t know about Thai, but the Chinese is, if you’re a collector, you don’t hang your paintings everywhere. There is a little treasure room, usually your studies. So invite all your friends going there, drinking tea or drinking wine. And then you open it and you share it all, the carving of the jade. So you speak, you enjoy each self. It’s not like the West. But now our whole lifestyle has changed. We don’t have this Asian lifestyle. We go in the house, everybody is hanging every. So we lost that sort of lifestyle. So as an architect, when you design things, how are you, you know, you’re not promoting a different lifestyle. You’re doing this and how, how do you merge?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, museum, you know, there’s a lot of talked about what is the role of museum in 21st century? Again, it started before, but museum become what it is with the 19th century concept of colonization. People show, I mean, when you look at all the big, the great museums in the world, they’re all, of course, the Louvre, they’re all from the colony. It’s about showing what we have from our colonies. Right.

Pearl Lam: By invading our culture

Kulapat Yantrasast: But not to teach you about. But that’s okay. But then we need to think about, okay, how do we take museum away from their sense of possession, sense of conquering to talk about creativity, talk about, again, empathy of culture and also melting.

Pearl Lam: Of using these objects to understand the culture, the philosophy.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah, so you don’t have to throw the baby with the water. Like meaning the treasure is still there. We just have to reposition to look at them not as, as a product of colonization, not as a conquest, but as objects or as a point of departure to tell stories rather than look. Someone just hacked this from a temple. But it’s a different take. It’s still the same thing. You can still see that it was hacked from a temple. But instead of looking at that and looking at the conquering and the colonizing part of it, which we can continue to debate and talked about, in the meantime, we can also focus on the artistic heritage and the story that could be told through those objects too.

Pearl Lam: Wow. I like it. Because now, not that you just design galleries, you’re designing a journey.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Thank, thank, thank you.

Pearl Lam: I mean, I mean, walking into a 75,000 sqft museum, you know, you have to design a whole, I mean, the whole journey, walking through and how to get excited.

Kulapat Yantrasast: But interesting. They miss anything. Oh, should I do this? You know, you’re not living someone else’s experience or expectation. You kind of question yourself at all times, what do I want to see and what do I think about? Which is, again, I know it’s a long road for museum to be able to do that because we all, including myself, we were trained to follow a story like, oh yes, of course. Because like I work with a lot of museums, population communities, a lot of them were like, it’s not for us. Like when I work, when I work not only in cities but in smaller towns and I talked to people at all times and they said, I don’t think it’s for us. I was like, why? Because, and especially in America, sadly, minorities were not even allowed to go to museums until the sixties. Right? So it’s a, it’s a, it’s a big hurdle we have to go through. But when they, when they start to kind of understand, they say, okay, so back to what you said, we have to give them also a sense of who they are rather than just like you here, because we need to educate you. Which museum was used in that purpose to conform people to the same story? But now we use it in a different way. You can find your own story.

Pearl Lam: So do you still believe that museum would leave a legacy even as a different 100%?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Of course, we talk about AI these days.

Pearl Lam: Yes, exactly.

Kulapat Yantrasast: And I’m a big fan of AI, to be honest. And you start to think because we went through so many technologies, we’re doing a big project, a museum right now in Saudi Arabia. Big one. And I always talk to my team because I’m so excited. AI, I actually sent our staff to be trained in AI. We want to be at the best of the game.

Pearl Lam: I can draft.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Oh, yeah. Well, whether you let it do it on its own or whether you want to collaborate and have them assist you, it’s different thing. Right. I was talking to my team, like, we’re doing this big museum on that team. It’s 20 people. I said, well, imagine if you don’t have cad, which is computer aided design. Right. If you don’t have cad, how many people do you think need on this project? Without cad, it’s going to be around 150 people.

Pearl Lam: Yeah. And then it will take a very long time.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Exactly. Now 200. Now to 20. Right. But if you use AI, that 20 might become four. So the question is, and of course the first thing everyone thinks is like, oh, my God, we all going to lose jobs, but we’ve been losing jobs since then. So technology should allow us to be smart too, because technically we take some job from us. But there are other jobs that technology might not be able to do as well as humans, including creativity disruption. Right. So I felt, going back to what you said, I think that human are trained to be better because the tool that we made are doing something for us. So we have to move on to do something that the tool.

Pearl Lam: Anyway, we have to evolve because technology has pushed us to evolve if we can never stay at the same place, because with technology we should take advantage of it and move in front. Front. Another big question I have to ask you is I just asked you whether you’ve read the book Humanized, but you haven’t. But you must have read about Kabuzia, his name as the God of boredom and one of the things that I think I agree with Thomas saying that is not every beauty of Kabusia. Kabuzi have some really fantastic beauty with right proportion and all that. But the whole idea of what Kabusi has been promoting, so many people just copy it and do exactly the same thing again and again and again to the extent that the world now, they all look the same.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, I think Thomas trying to have a position, right.

Pearl Lam: Of course.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I think he wants to sound by. So I don’t understand. But when you make a bold statement like that, maybe half is, you know, deserving and half is not.

Pearl Lam: Because it’s a good point of discussion.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah, exactly.

Pearl Lam: I think what is great is it makes you aware of what is happening. Because, like, when I went to real, I thought Rio and Soul looks very much alike. Not real, real.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah, but it’s not just Kabuzie. But it’s very true that we still living under the shadow of the monomaster that we’re dealing with. Le Corbusier doesn’t have as much impact on the urban city as Miss van der Rohe.

Pearl Lam: Of course. Of course.

Kulapat Yantrasast: All the office buildings today, right? Those are Miss van der Rohe’s towers, the glass towers, cabousier’s, more the concrete of these low rise, because.

Pearl Lam: Yes, you’re right. Mies is in Seagram.

Kulapat Yantrasast: But they both have a vision for the future. If anything, we should blame ourselves for not being able to evolve further.

Pearl Lam: I think the vision of the future is also the reaction of your old classical building. Because at the time, when you see all the art nouveau and all the 19th century or 18th century is all the molding, it’s just a reaction. But then some of the buildings, it’s not, you know, when I always say that, you know, modernist building is great if they have the proportion. But some of these architect, they adopt the idea of a modernist beauty, but without proportion.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I agree.

Pearl Lam: So it didn’t work.

Kulapat Yantrasast: So it looks horrible and it become a symbol rather than something, right? No, I agree. I think that architects, including Thomas, is too obsessed with style because it seems and everyone trying to invent the form every time, like, we have to have a new form, new form, new form, new form, new form. And form is emphasized over space, over life, over experience, over living. The price to pay. Imagine, you know, way back when, when people go to the debutante gown and everyone wanted to have an ochre couture dress, right? We still live in that time. Everyone want to have their own orchestra dress, even though they don’t have money. They just have to have a copy of the thing that looked like that dress. Right. And so. But in reality, does that dress define life? No, it’s definitely not comfortable. A lot of times, it’s actually not even made with the character of the person. So I felt that, in a way, Thomas was right in pointing that we’re still in the shadow of Le Corbusier, but he’s long dead. He doesn’t do this.

Pearl Lam: Because what I love some of your design is you don’t design for yourself. You design for your client, which I think is very important. You incorporate, you know?

Kulapat Yantrasast: And I don’t want it to be the same. Right. I don’t want my building to look like the same thing all the time. Right. Which is a reaction to the previous generation. Right. Not just Ando, but Richard Meyer. And, of course, the style is so clear that it becomes like, yes, I’m going to do this building in Caracas or in Korea. It will still look alike because it’s about me and my signature. I’m less interested in that because I don’t think it’s a proof of intelligence, to be honest. I think I like the idea going back to cooking, right. If I want to do a fried rice in a mountain or by the sea, it will be two different dishes, even though it’s the same cook. Right. Because you want to engage with the local ingredients, with the urban techniques or whatever. That’s who I see myself as. As my achievement.

Pearl Lam: Yeah, that’s true.

Kulapat Yantrasast: In this weird identity thing, we always.

Pearl Lam: Say that even with fashion, you have to be wearing the clothes, not the clothes wearing you. And which is a really important thing.

Kulapat Yantrasast: You’re the case in point. The clothes never wear you.

Pearl Lam: No, you cannot, because it’s your personality which is important, and you choose your. Your things that fits you. The same thing with architecture. If you own something, especially with own house, with your own hope, it has to be you.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Absolutely. And I think that’s the part that it’s a long journey, right. Because the modern times is quite short. Right. When you think about the period that we think about Le Corbusier and other, it’s a little bit more than 100 years. We live in a year, a world.

Pearl Lam: Which is 100 years now.

Kulapat Yantrasast: So we’re now reacting only to that, because it’s the history that we know and the other previous history, I think. But there’s now this longing to connect to a larger, a longer history. Because what’s good about modernity is about the now. But knowing the now at the expense of cutting ties with everything else, with history. We’re not supposed to talk about history.

Pearl Lam: The fringier art in architecture.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Well, as Frankery said, architecture has windows done. We have toilets, too. And we have building codes.

Pearl Lam: Because fine art, under fine art, there’s architecture.

Kulapat Yantrasast: That’s true. Well, but the thing is architecture has different kind of power than art.

Pearl Lam: Much more powerful than art.

Kulapat Yantrasast: It’s a different part. The problem, people want to look at architecture as sculpture, right? They say, oh, that architect, that architecture.

Pearl Lam: How politics or government, how to project their political ideas. You know, you look at those fascist beauty, it just shows.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Exactly. Because it’s about authority, it’s about control. But also have a beauty. Beauty.

Pearl Lam: You know, when I would go to Milan, I saw some of those fascist beauty. It’s beautiful.

Kulapat Yantrasast: When you look at powerful, beautiful. The dictators are very smart. They always use architecture. You know, look at Hitler, Hitler with his special architect, right? They know how to use architecture because.

Pearl Lam: They have to project power.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Exactly. And architecture is an art form to celebrate, to glorify. As if living a life is already not enough, you have to do something else. But back to art, I think art, you know, I don’t remember who said that, but art, I like doors and windows, right. That open into different worlds.

Pearl Lam: Absolutely.

Kulapat Yantrasast: You might, you know, of course, with the Internet, you feel, and also you.

Pearl Lam: Your community start changing.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah.

Pearl Lam: And you have a complete different community, which is really inspiring because, I mean, you know, you have your business community, you have clients, and then you have very artistic community who is. Who may be completely different from all others. And that is inspired. That is exciting.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I agree with you. Like, when I go back to Thailand, when we have a reunion, out of 50 people, 49 are doctors. And they talk about doctors things like, you know, like clinics and, you know, all of those things, right? And I feel like, oh, my God, I. Get me out of here. I don’t really know how to. Not that, you know, they’re not there. Doctors who are very enlightened and smart, typical Asians.

Pearl Lam: This is Asian culture.

Kulapat Yantrasast: But you’re right. People that are curious, right? Like, I mean, not only artists, art collectors, people are looking for things. And then I think there’s a whole healthy conversation around the purpose of life.

Pearl Lam: Because I think when you have it, you know, a good topic is you have to be able to talk about everything. So, Kutabak, so what do you think about the future of architect? I know that we’ve touched some about AI. So how do you imagine the future of architecture will be?

Kulapat Yantrasast: Let’s just say that actually that I would like it to be.

Pearl Lam: Yeah. What we would like it to be.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Is that it’s so close to human life. I want people to. Not that I want to lose my job, but I want people to be able to build their own homes.

Pearl Lam: Oh, yeah.

Kulapat Yantrasast: To do their own thing. Right. Just like the fact that you cook your own dinner doesn’t mean that you lose sight of what a good chef does. Right? It’s actually. You actually appreciate it more.

Pearl Lam: Exactly, exactly.

Kulapat Yantrasast: So I felt that I want architecture to be as close to people as food. So people can actually use AI or use autocad or use other things to design their own thing things. And when they do that, hopefully they will appreciate what the professionals can give to them. And if you do that, the game.

Pearl Lam: Is higher, of course, but it’s great. What you said is if they can design your own house, they will appreciate what an architect does much more. Because an architect is just like a conductor. They have to put everybody together and the patience that you needed, you know.

Kulapat Yantrasast: So much about it. I think the conductor is what we need in the world. Right. Because I think like, diversity need a good conductor.

Pearl Lam: Absolutely.

Kulapat Yantrasast: To be able to bring those diverse voices together and not create chaos, but create harmony, create symphony.

Pearl Lam: This is, I mean, this is only one line difference from chaos to harmony. It’s really. But because you’re buddhist, that’s why you talk about harmony. This is your time brought up.

Kulapat Yantrasast: I think so. Even though when I was in Thailand, I hated the word harmony because it felt so sweet and so, like, you know, like, like, because I was, I was, I was like longing for conflict and disruptions and things.

Pearl Lam: Oh, because this is the contrary.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah, because entirely everything so sweet and so, like, you know, compliance. Exactly. But so, but I think the job of a conductor is not just harmony. Right. But it’s. Maybe it’s coordination or orchestration. It can be.

Pearl Lam: Orchestration is.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Yeah. So I think that, and I work a lot on culture projects that have so many voices. Right. And a lot of times we architect tend to ignore those voices for the sake of make it easier to build. Right. Because if you want something strong, it used to be one person gave you an idea who, the client just built it. But that’s dictator. We see that in the past, but.

Pearl Lam: You see buildings, which is dictation of beauty.

Kulapat Yantrasast: But in the future, if you’re going to create a sense of unity, biodiversity, you’re going to need a different kind of muscle to be able to bring that strength out of diversity, which is a lot more difficult because before that you need one person to make a building. And now you need to make 100 people. I like that.

Pearl Lam: On this note, I would like to say thank you for joining me today, and I will see you in Hong Kong.

Kulapat Yantrasast: Thank you. Such an honor. Thank you, everyone. Thank you.