Former engineering school funded by UK tycoon reemerges as design institute

The Henry Lester Institute of Technical Education at 505 East Changzhi Road.

A file photo of the Henry Lester Institute of Technical Education at 505 East Changzhi Road.

An 88-year-old building, one of Shanghai's earliest technical schools finished its renovation, on Thursday, with the original decor largely preserved and historical look fully restored.

The Henry Lester Institute of Technical Education at 505 East Changzhi Road on the North Bund of Hongkou District will become the Design Innovation Institute Shanghai, attracting top talent in design.

Over 70 percent of the original decor and features of the building have been preserved, including over 1,000 wall tiles, along with the double-layer windows, steel doors and wooden strip floors, an official from the North Bund Development Group in charge of renovations told Shanghai Daily.

The facelift project was launched in December 2021 to restore the original look of the classrooms, dormitory, auditorium, library, museum, labs, canteen and headmaster's room.

The building, blending Gothic Revival and ArtDeco architecture, features a five-story central tower, four and three stories on both of the wing buildings, and resemble a sailing ship or jet when seen from an aerial view.

The preserved auditorium of the school.

An old photo of the original auditorium.

It was built in 1934 in accordance with the will of British tycoon Henry Lester (1840–1926), one of the richest merchants in Shanghai, commissioning a school for at least 300 Chinese and foreign students.

Before he died in 1926, Lester, who had no children, donated almost all his assets to build the Lester Chinese Hospital, the Henry Lester Institute of Medical Research and the institute, along with other philanthropic projects. His charity foundation is still supporting Chinese postgraduates in architecture in the United Kingdom.

Though the institute had operated for only a decade until the outbreak of World War II in 1945, it had cultivated multiple leading professionals, including Gu Maoxiang, a member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Chen Zhanxiang, the former chief engineer of China's Ministry of Urban-Rural Construction, and famous translator Cao Ying.

One of the center's unique characteristics was that teachers used no textbooks, and encouraged students to take notes and gain more practical knowledge. It was one of the best engineering colleges in Shanghai then, on par with Jiao Tong and St. John's universities.

An engineer moves the original blackboard in the terrace classroom.

An old photo of a blackboard in an original classroom.

The institute was occupied by Japanese invaders in 1942. After the war, it was converted into a maritime technical school and later become the Shanghai Seaman Hospital mainly for domestic and foreign sailors until the recent decade. It was listed as a protected building by the city government in 1994.

"The building was relatively well-protected, so we've tried our best to keep the original features. Only the broken or missing parts were recreated with the same materials and techniques," said the official.

The steel gates of the building, which have patterns of compasses, balances and beakers, were replicated according to the original gates which are collected at the Shanghai History Museum.

A blackboard with two pulleys on the top dates back to 1930. Though the glass on the surface has cracked, the engineers kept the original staff as a "memory of its history," he said.

The headmaster of the school poses in his office.

The ceiling of a conference room and the walls of a former painting room are exposed without any paint to showcase the traditional techniques, which are rarely seen nowadays.

Many senior masons and carpenters were invited to refurbish the original doors and tiles.

"We only changed the bronze bolts and hinges, but retained the wooden parts of each door," said Wang Liang, a senior carpenter from central China's Hunan Province.

Even several old arbor trees have been kept in the garden in front of the building, along with the foundation stone laid by the China's Ministry of Education Dr Wang Shijie and former Consul General of Britain in Shanghai John Brenan.

Standing on the balcony of the former headmaster's room, visitors can see both the preserved exterior walls of the institute and landmarks of the North Bund waterfront, such as the towering Sinar Mas Plaza, the tallest building in Puxi.

The future design institute plans to conduct wide international exchanges and public education on design and innovation sectors. It's expected to become an innovation engine for Shanghai's sustainable development, according to the Hongkou government.

The building will become the Design Innovation Institute Shanghai.

Source: SHINE

Frontier Design Prize Announces Winners at World Design Cities Conference

Shanghai, September 15, 2022 | The Frontier Design Prize announced the winners of its inaugural edition during the opening ceremony of the World Design Cities Conference (WDCC). Mr. QU Xing, Deputy Director-General of UNESCO, Mr. GONG Zheng, Mayor of Shanghai, Ms. XU Xiaolan, Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology (China), along with leading designers, scholars and industry leaders, attended the award ceremony.

The Frontier Design Prize (FDP) is a visionary, innovative, world-class design award established with the aims of encouraging design innovation, enhancing the impact of design in driving industrial transformation, and promoting the role of design in shaping a better world. A central program of WDCC, it is undertaken by Design Innovation Institute Shanghai (DIIS) with guidance from the Shanghai Municipal Government. 

Three prize categories are set up to reward and recognize outstanding personalities and works of design that have made a pioneering contribution to the design field with far-reaching international influence: Distinguished Contribution, Innovation of the Year, and Innovation of the Year (K-12). FDP is the first international design prize to recognize the work of K-12 students.  In 2022, the Distinguished Contribution Prize and Innovation of the Year Prize have a monetary award of 1 million RMB respectively, and the Innovation of the Year (K-12) winners will share an award of 100,000 RMB. 

This year’s winners are:

Distinguished Contribution
-Donald Arthur Norman
Citation: Prof. Don Norman is the leading advocate of human-centered design and a pioneer in user experience design. Combining design with social science and engineering, he has made pioneering contributions to the fields of cognitive science, human factors engineering and interaction design. His books, such as The Design of Everyday Things and Emotional Design, became classics well read by most design students and professionals around the world. His latest book, Design for a Better World argues for a more powerful use of designers as champions of human behavior in this time of ecological crises.

Innovation of the Year
-Mi Ecosystem (by De Liu & Mi Ecosystem Team) 
Citation: The Mi Ecosystem presents a truly systematic approach to design and manufacturing that empowers designers and design entrepreneurs through technical and supply chain support. To date, it has supported more than 330 design-driven startups, enabling an annual production value of close to 100 billion RMB, and has infused world-class design and the concept of smart living into the everyday lives of 63-million Chinese middle-class families.

Innovation of the Year (K-12)
-Modular Garbage Front-end Processor Combination (by Zekai Ren, Shanghai, China)
Citation: This project tackled the unpleasant and yet often neglected process of garbage collection and storage in residential communities with a bold and integrated proposal. The proposed distributed waste processor combines composting with other forms of biological treatment, localizing waste treatment to reduce pollution and noise from collection, and turning the waste station from an eyesore to a potential community center.

-Reducing Gender Based Violence in Sierra Leone (by 30 students at Rising Academy, Sierra Leone)
Citation: The boys and girls with an average age of 15 who took part in this design project had no previous exposure to design but demonstrated an ability to quickly adopt a designer mindset, to tap into their lived experience to gain insights, and to take on a very challenging social problem and propose innovative solutions with potential for wide adoption.

This year's evaluation committee, chaired by Prof. Rosanne Somerson, President Emerita of Rhode Island School of Design, includes 19 design leaders from international institutions including Royal College of Art, MIT, Parsons, Politecnico di Milano, Aalto University, Tongji University, Tsinghua University.

Prof. LOU Yongqi, Chair of the FDP committee, said, “Frontier Design Prize is a very unique international design award that recognizes individuals and works that had paradigm-shifting contributions to design in a large scale.” Prof. Don Norman, the winner of the Distinguished Contribution Prize, said: “I'm glad to see that Shanghai is now using design to shape higher quality sustainable development.”

The nomination-only award collected expert recommendations from around the world, and employed a unique evaluation process that supplements jury voting with AI analysis.

As reference for the jury, a proprietary AI-powered assessment system was developed by Tezign that utilizes knowledge graph and impact factors to evaluate the quantitative performance of the nominees in various dimensions.  

About DIIS:

Design Innovation Institute Shanghai (DIIS) is a non-profit advanced research institution dedicated to creating world-leading design innovation with real-world impact. Located in the North Bund CBD area of Shanghai, DIIS was founded in 2020 in cooperation with Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization, Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, and Shanghai Hongkou District Government. With a global design ecosystem and advanced technological research, DIIS is driving industrial transformation through design innovation.

Lester Project Scheduled for Completion in 2022

In early June, Shanghai entered the phase of regular epidemic prevention and control, while work and production resumed accordingly. A series of key projects in the North Bund area are scheduled to be completed within this year, including the Design Innovation Institute Shanghai project, involving the renovation and preservation of the main building of the former Henry Lester Institute of Technical Education. This project will drive industry development through design innovation and directly serve North Bund development. Details are shared through Shanghai official media platform Wen Hui Bao on June 25th, 2022.

New Fashion Without New Clothes? - Design Universe Master Talk Ep.2

In our second episode of Master Talks, Prof. Simon Collins hosted and led a panel discussion on New Fashion Without New Clothes. Invited panelists were Eric Liu, Elodie Rousselot, Dominique Simard, Winton Choi, Chen Zhi, and Mark Ainsworth, the leading figures in the interdisciplinary fashion and technology fields. Simon moderated the panel with well-directed questions focusing on sustainability, cutting-edge new technology like NFT, and diversity to create transformative innovation for the fashion industry. Prof. Collins kept the audience engaged throughout the 2-hour event by presenting an in-depth interpretation of the New Fashion Without New Clothes concept and innovation, bringing us a thought-provoking feast of ideas!

Read more

Design, What Now? — Design Universe Master Talk Ep.1 Successfully Held on May 14th

How might we use design to drive innovation, empower industry and create world-changing impact? These are questions that we explore at Design Universe. As part of the inaugural roadshow in 2021, Design Universe hosted 18 Master Talks, inviting distinguished guests from different fields to share insights on design innovation through speeches and dialogues.

Despite the pandemic, Design Universe resumed as planned this year with a live-streamed Master Talk on May 14^th. This first episode set the theme on “Design, What Now”, featuring a celebrated roster including Zexiang Li, Yongqi Lou, Min Wang, Simon Collins, Srini Srinivasan and Aldo Cibic. The event presented a feast of ideas to a large audience of more than 9000 and successfully kicked off the event series.

Read more: Event recap

Design Universe WeChat Account Successfully Launched

Design Universe WeChat Account Successfully Launched After careful preparation, DIIS kicks off the Design Universe official WeChat account on May 5th, 2022, as a platform for and community of design innovation. We will document the wonderful moments from Design Universe inaugural event, announce this year’s following Design Universe event series, and share insights, ideas, and actions from the community. Please stay tuned.

Design Universe Sets Sail

DIIS Participates at WDCC Promotion Conference

DIIS actively participates in the preparation of the 1st World Design City Conference in Shanghai, provides suggestions for the government, participates in the formulation of a document “Guidance on building a World-Class Design City", and will award the 1st Frontier Design Prize at the conference, and jointly participate in the release of the Hillhouse Design Industry Fund (proposed). 

To Launch Shanghai as a World Design City, on behalf of DIIS, Prof. Simon Collins gave a speech on Global Design Thinking in Shanghai. Using examples of Chinese and local innovation, Prof. Simon Collins presented examples of how Shanghai can use transformative industrial innovation to play a vital role in the Future of New Fashion. 

With its theme of "Envision the Future Design of Inclusion", the WDCC 2022 is welcoming 40 design cities from more than 31 countries to develop a shared dialogue with world leading design professionals in a 4-day program of summits and online conferences. Shanghai as the hosting city, is engaging different communities to share our ability to collaborate and magnifies the impact of our work. WDCC 2022 is inviting all stakeholders to share their global design resources, aiming to create new dynamic of cross-sector and cross-border innovative design ecosystems.

Image source: WDCC

DIIS Becomes SHDW Strategic Co-creation Partner

As an important part of the 10-year strategic plan of Shanghai Design Week, 10 distinguished organizations in the design field are invited to become co-creation partners with SHDW, which was announced at the WDCC Promotion Conference in Feb, 2022. As a co-creation partner in Design Education, DIIS will carry out in-depth collaboration with SHDW with talent cultivation and thematic events that are integrated with the city and linked with the rest of the world,

Image source: SHDW

DIIS Speaks at GLV Conference

At a conference organized by GLV to share best practices on new retail brands going global, on behalf of DIIS, Prof. Simon Collins presented a speech on the concept of using design thinking to Go Global.

DIIS Becomes a WDO Member

DIIS became a registered member of the World Design Organization (WDO) in January 2022, opening the door to international cooperation. World Design Organization (WDO)® is a globally recognized non-governmental organization that aims to promote and advance the discipline of industrial design and its power to enhance economic, social, cultural and environmental quality of life. (www.wdo.org)

Image source: WDO

Jan 2022 DIIS Phase I Construction Begins

The future campus of DIIS will be centered around the former site of the Lester Institute of Technology. After months of design work and site preparation, construction begins in January to renovate the near-century-old Lester main building to restore historic characters as well as to accommodate future needs. A kickoff ceremony was held at the site, with substantial completion scheduled for the fall of 2022.

Image source: NBD

DIIS in News:

Kan Kan News | 65 major projects carried out this year, with a total investment of more than 190 billion yuan.

Wen Hui Daily | The former site of the 87Y-old institute of technology started its 1st grand renovation.

Shanghai Release | Led by the "three cultural places", renovating historical buildings, creating of a series of living rooms, and the enhancement of the soft power of the urban area - the future blueprint of Hongkou is depicted in this way.

Int’l Competition Announces Winning Scheme for New Building

After four months of design work and multiple rounds of review, the international design competition for the new building at former Lester Institute of Technology announces the final results. Shanghai-based renowed architectural design firm Atelier Deshaus was awarded the winning proposal.

Image source: NBD, Deshaus

DIIS in News:
SH Hongkou Media | Announcement of the concept of Lester Institute of Technology project.
 

Successful Design Universe Paves Way for Future DIIS Initiatives

As DIIS’ first public event since its establishment, the inaugural “Design Universe” 48-hour Roadshow was successfully held from Oct 22nd to 24th, 2021 at the historic Lester Building in North Bund, Shanghai. The 2-day event featured unique and impressive programs such as the Lester Lighting Show, Master Classes, Thematic Cluster (TC) workshops, project roadshow, and finale gala. It has been highly recognized by guests from academia and industry, and attracted enthusiastic feedback from all participants. With the launch of the “Design Universe” platform, DIIS has taken a decisive step towards creating an ecosystem of design innovation.

DIIS in News:

Shanghai Municipal Committee of Economy and Information | Devote to DU and jointly promote the building Design Capital

SH Hongkou | The 85Y-old "magic" building in Hongkou has become a “Thematic Cluster" for young designers.

SH Hongkou | Once again, Lester Institute of Technology is lit up.

ELLEDECO | Kartell classic chairs unveiled at Shanghai 'Design Universe'

DIIS Collaborates with North Bund Group on Design Universe Workshop Design

As an integral event planning process and the future mode of university-city integration, DIIS works closely with North Bund, the leading organization for the development of the North Bund area, to formulate the thematic focuses for the four workshops of Design Universe. Based on real-world challenges and physical locations, entrepreneurial design ideas will be explored and developed during the Design Universe workshops.

DIIS Starts Collaborative Partnership with IDEO on Design Universe

World-renowned design consultancy and ambassador of Design Thinking, IDEO will join the DIIS community as an important collaborative partner. The IDEO team including Charles Hayes, Managing Director and Yao Chen, Senior Lead, will provide content planning, teaching support and process facilitation for the four workshops during the inaugural Design Universe.

Image source: IDEO

Design Universe Under Planning

Design Universe, a 2.5-day event, will be held at the future site of DIIS on Oct 18th -20th. The roadshow event intends to represent the ideology and framework of DIIS. Sixteen masters from different industries will give lectures while four workshops will tackle real-world challenges with a post-disciplinary approach central to the pedagogical setup of DIIS.

Int’l Design Competition for New Building on Lester Site Kicks Off

In July, Shanghai North Bund Group and Shanghai International Tendering Company announced the international design competition for a new building adjacent to the historic Lester Institute of Technology to house a world-leading design innovation institute. After a public application and pre-qualification process, four internationally renowned architectural design firms, including David Chipperfield Architects, JKMM, Henning Larsen and Deshaus, are shortlisted and enter the design period.

Image source: NBD

DIIS Moves into Office in Shanghai North Bund

The rapidly-growing DIIS team moves into its new office in Sinar Mas Plaza at the heart of North Bund area, Hongkou District, Shanghai, right next to the historical Lester Institute of Technology.

Image source: from internet. If violation of copyright, please contact us for removing it.

DIIS Officially Established in Shanghai

A non-governmental and not-for-profit organization, Design Innovation Institute Shanghai was announced in 2020 at the 10th Anniversary of Shanghai joining UNESCO Creative Cities Network as “City of Design” and established as advanced research institution dedicated to providing world-leading design education, research and innovation transformation. 

Image source: SHEITC