Well London today is of course one of the great world cities.
I think London is the most international and most vibrant city there is and I would say
probably worldwide.
London is a remarkably successful place at attracting really smart, bright, gifted young
designers.
It's a sort of belly of the world.
And you can also feel that it's truly multicultural in the way, in the same way as New York is.
And many people, young people but also people from all over the world is attracted because
London is open.
I think London has always been a place that's incredibly tolerant of new things, of people
arriving in the city.
We know that the city is based on immigration, it's based on people arriving and the people
who are already here tolerating them.
But what I think is so special with London is it's vast size, it's so big.
The platform I've been in the city was absolutely amazing, to share thoughts with the people
I liked and to be created by going to institutions such as the British Museum or amazing libraries
that there are around or the V&A, I mean there's always a lot to learn.
Working in a place that is so exciting is always an occasion for a stimulator brain.
The city itself has changed a lot I think in the last eight, nine years.
You can feel that it's much more expensive.
Production is not the most amazing, I mean you've got to travel a lot when you're based
in London and that's like costy and it's complicated if you're setting up a business.
If you're starting out as a young designer, London is quite an expensive place to be.
You might find yourself migrating right out to the external edges of the city.
There's a lot of traffic, you know, like the weather is never like the most amazing ones.
London has really based its success on 150 years of great art schools.
We're spoiled for good schools of architecture here.
They come to study here and lots of them stay and build a practice, not necessarily based
on clients here but on clients all around the world.
The overly large proportion of architects in London is obviously because the education
system has been strong here.
We all know there are little London's all over the world in other cities where people
who have studied here still keep in touch and have that umbilical connection to here.
Schools are under threat from the lack of government funding.
And they have been somewhat industrialised, they've got too big and the government is
also getting rather curious about allowing students to stay once they graduate.
Any kind of political agenda that tries to limit particularly the influx of international
students to the UK is a disaster, a disaster for the schools, it's a disaster for design
culture here because let's face it, if those people weren't coming and designers weren't
here, there's no manufacturing, there's nothing else, what we are is a crossroads for great
creative people.
Many young fresh designers come from here but you don't have so many strong brands.
So for us it's an interesting market to be part of.
But design is a very competitive process, lots of places want to be the design capital
of the world and London's energy is I think going through a renaissance at the moment.
Certainly we should keep London as open a city as it can be and any political agenda
that's about sort of closing that down somehow is to me just a nothing matter what London
really is.
London is a great place to be but it can't be complacent and one of the things it has
to do is to go on being interesting and attractive and attracting new people, smart people and
getting to stay.
