A nation's traditional culture is always different from that of other nations, yet today's world is increasingly "flat." In design creation, you have always emphasized our own national culture. How do you view the relationship between the national and the global?

　　Wang Yanchen: For every person, no matter where they are born, where they grow up, or how far they roam, the things of their origins always pull at them. That is a sense of belonging. When we are young, we want to go out and explore the world; when we are older, we suddenly look back and find that what we are attached to is still the place that gave us life and raised us, the fertile ground where our bodies and souls survive and grow.

　　Life is largely like this, and it prompts us to think about design. Chinese-style design is rooted in China's vast cultural history. Having endured thousands of years of sedimentation and grown from a rich root system of civilization, it continues to this day. What later generations must do is excavate and organize it, then express it with modern perspectives and methods. This requires a prudent attitude and serious practice.

　　Yet we do not reject foreign civilizations or deny Western architectural culture. But we have to admit that in China during its great construction drive, when clients insist on European, American, or Italian-style architecture and interior space design, Chinese people's understanding of the cultures of those countries is lacking. Likewise, foreign designers rarely produce well-received Chinese-style designs, with the exception of a very few interior space designers like Michel, because their understanding of traditional Chinese culture is only skin-deep.

　　Symbolic expression often reveals that the designer has only dabbled in or misread a culture not their own, or has a shallow understanding of their own culture. To deeply understand the culture of a region, a designer must live there for a long time, live alongside the people there, properly understand the local culture, and express it appropriately.

　　Tradition and the present, the national and the global—these will always be themes of discussion and debate in the design industry. The designs honored by the Pritzker Prize are always projects that properly resolve and integrate these two contradictions, such as the Chinese architect Wang Shu, who won the prize in 2012 and used traditional Chinese materials to express contemporary architectural space.

　　The greatest characteristic of today's society is the trend toward globalization. Whether in economic, cultural, or social terms, advanced information and transportation have made the world essentially feel without distance, and homogenization is increasingly apparent. This undoubtedly causes a loss of individuality. For national culture, the loss of individuality is the greatest loss, causing a rupture in cultural continuity and the disappearance of cultural characteristics.

　　Today we can see that most new buildings around the world are designed in fairly similar ways. Designers keep talking about the characteristics and innovation of design, and take pride in designs that appropriately express the language of local culture. So how should we handle these two seemingly contradictory yet not truly contradictory things—local culture (the accumulation of history) and innovation (contemporary space)? First, please preserve the uniqueness of your national culture and protect the continuity of history, because nothing has ever come from nothing.

　　Every effect has a cause; there is no design without reason. Design must always have a foundation and a source, no matter which nation or culture it comes from. China's traditional cultural history is too ancient, and any bit of its essence is splendid. Therefore, there is no need to copy it one hundred percent; as long as you find the cultural traits within it, you can confidently apply them to new cases.

　　In doing so, my personal view is that I hope the beautiful traditional culture retains a spiritual continuity, but the face it presents to society must be contemporary. For example, design rooted in Song dynasty culture requires designers to be able to bring the aesthetic spirit and life philosophy of the Song dynasty into today, then use today's means and methods to express them in a given space. That is living design. Creativity does not mean you must abruptly abandon the past; completely original innovation does not exist in this world. Innovation also has a source, and without learning and inheritance, so-called new things will not emerge. It is like an evolving biological chain, interlocking and spiraling upward.