Fueled by the growth of more modern interior design in the area, ranging from the growing coffee shop and restaurant market to the rise of the Minsu (old farmhouse turned upscale Bed and Breakfast) the Baibiao recycled wood market has been expanding steadily over the last twenty years. Salvaging wood from abandoned or demolished towns and neighbourhoods, the 312 families working and in some cases living in the market sell it on to new projects. Beyond wood, the market is also a treasure trove of furniture and knick-knacks spanning decades if not centuries of Chinese history. The more than 300 warehouses span 266 000 sq metres making it the largest recycled wood markets in Zhejiang province.  

Unfortunately, as many of these stories go, the industrial city of Deqing is quickly expanding, swallowing up the neighbouring rice fields, the Baibiao recycled wood market is set to be bulldozed next week so the land can be resold to developers, leaving the business owners scrambling to find storage and new locations for their businesses.

Wandering through the market was a stunning reminder of China’s history of exquisite craftsmanship. Almost everything you see is meticulously hand-carved; warehouse after warehouse of intricately widdled window shutters or doors serving as a reminder that for thousands of years the term ‘Made in China’ was not at all synonyms with ‘cheap’, but rather served as the gold standard for created product, fit, literally, for kings and queens all over the globe.

China loves beer, and with the largest population in the world, it isn’t surprising that they consume more of it than anyone else - more than twice as much as the US in fact. In Qingdao, home to China’s second largest, but perhaps most known beer @tsingtao, over a million people will flock to the city to partake in the annual beer festival, with over 1,300 types of beer, food and performances. 

Last year, during the 17 day festival, the 1 million attendees drank 680 tons of beer.

Beer consumption in China is quickly becoming more premium, whether it’s local craft beers, or imported beers, there is a real thirst for the beverage. Even the beloved American classic Budweiser is, as announced last week, is now consumed more in China than in it’s homeland. 

With all that being said, can you guess what the most consumed beer in the world is? - because it is not what you think.

One thing you notice a lot when traveling in China, interestingly, are premium door advertisement. Literally. Fancy doors. Billboards everywhere. This speaks to the trend of premiumisation you can see all over China. From beer, to holidays, to hair salons. 

This is an incredible opportunity, opening doors (pun totally intended) not just for brands, but also artists. 

This week I met Maomao a young successful artist coming from a family of interior designers who took a different path and is now creating fine art in the form of table decorations. With an impressive resume which includes brands like Mercedes Benz, she has done dozens of pieces this year. Her commentary is often a reflection of cultural intersections or our relationship with our environment. This particular piece, done for naked Retreats called 'nest’ was a statement of our carelessness and wasteful consumption. A thoughtful reminder as China's consumption booms of what is at stake.

Cape Town has only just begun to ease water restrictions from what could be one of the first of many major water crises we will face as a planet. There is always so much we could do to reduce our water consumption - shorter showers, dripping taps, water saving appliances - however those items are barely a drop in the bucket when you begin to look into the water footprint of what we consume. Whether it is plastic, cotton, meat, or petrol, there is so much water used in the production, the feed, or the transportation of almost everything we come in contact with. 

I met the new chef at kikaboni, the fine dining restaurant at naked Stables in Moganshan, China during a sustainability event celebrating the launch of a new analytics system to make guests more aware of their energy and water use at the resort. We started talking about meat and the tens of thousands of litres required to produce it, a few ‘give-or-take’ calculations started to reveal that all the water savings that could be achieved by this new system could be beaten simply by taking beef off the menu for a week, or not serving cashews at the resort.

Coming from South Africa, and having worked in kitchens in Cape Town during the water crisis, Conrad’s perspective gives a fresh angle on sustainability in some of the world's top restaurants. From zero water kitchens to using the whole animal, over the flair and noise of kikaboni’s kitchen, I got to hear about the meaningful impact a chef can make through their dishes. ‘You have to innovate if you want to boil an egg without water’. Every day, water scarcity is becoming more common and the pioneering done, not just in kitchens but in every aspect of consumption, is becoming more relevant. 

It’s just damn good to be assured that it will taste delicious as well.

As the heat of the summer fades in Moganshan, bamboo harvesting season approaches and landowners mark their trees to avoid confusion or foragers accidentally cutting their shoots. Fetching between 30-40rmb (about $5) each, bamboo is a widely used material, whether it's construction, basket weaving, carved into tools or even eaten.

This is Yip Qi Lai, from Songzhuang, China, a town of less than a 100 people, originally more than 600, it is one of the many examples of these county-side towns slowly disappearing as more young and able-bodied people move to the cities for work, leaving only the old and aging population in the villages. Yip is one of the younger men in the communities, at 66 years old, he makes his living mostly harvesting bamboo shoots and, at the ripe old age of 66, he will chop and collect about 1000kg of bamboo a day.