Jun
8
2021
Pineapple leaves, fungus fibres, sugarcane, cactus: all botanical elements used in the production of various kinds of plant-based leather. Inspired by the environmentally-sustainable thinking now sweeping the world, these so-called “vegan” leathers have become increasingly popular alternatives to hide leather.
May
24
2021
The different directions are as sharp as the angles on a multi-faceted brilliant. Pandora, the Danish company that makes the world’s most jewellery pieces, mostly inexpensive High Street ware, has announced it will no longer use naturally-mined diamonds.
May
16
2021
The robot arm zooms back and forth in the workshop of LifeArt in Hong Kong, shaping a sheet of thick, hard cardboard into a modern and environmentally kind cardboard coffin, or eco-coffin. Wilson Tong, chief representative of LifeArt, the only manufacturer of eco-friendly cardboard caskets and coffins in Hong Kong, believes they are the way …read more
Apr
26
2021
Ever-creeping climate change is spelling the end of the lawn as we know it. Environmentalists everywhere see the neat and weed-free grass lawn as an ecological disaster in an age of ever-increasing heat, shrinking water resources and increasingly scarce wild habitat.
Apr
2
2021
Alex Metcalfe started experimenting with no-alcohol beer about five years ago. Originally from Britain, he now lives in Hong Kong’s leafy Sai Kung district with his wife and two small children and he works as a teacher in a Hong Kong school. “I started drinking no-alcohol beer because I wanted to reduce my alcohol intake,” he …read more
Mar
25
2021
Those loaves of bread won’t be fresh enough for customers tomorrow, so tonight they will be collected by a charity for distribution to the hungry. The containers of cooked soup won’t be ordered by restaurant customers for a set lunch today, so tonight they will go to a discount food rescue app for a flash sale. …read more
Nov
22
2020
Qing dynasty treasures, including a carved white jade figure of the star god of longevity, Shulao, are scheduled for auction in Hong Kong on November 30 in a sale titled Imperial Glories from the Springfield Museums Collection.
Oct
1
2020
Considered an important medicine in China for 2,000 years, rhubarb has been discovered over and over again in its long history. Full of oxalic acid, rhubarb leaves might have poisoned a US president; smuggling valuable rhubarb root warranted death in Russia, and, centuries later, when the heavily sugared stalks were used in desserts, rhubarb was mercilessly …read more
Nov
14
2018
University of Western Australia vice-chancellor Dawn Freshwater is looking north. Perth’s universities have a distinct educational advantage in attracting Asian students: they are closer to important Asian centres than Australia’s eastern cities and they are in the same time zone as a substantial part of Asia.
Mar
15
2018
Stephen Hawking has left a big black hole in the hearts of millions: people who admired his enormous intellect, his wicked sense of humour, and his extraordinary courage in battling a debilitating medical condition that left him slumped in a wheelchair and communicating via a machine.