Vivien Chan is a design historian, educator, writer, and imagemaker based in the UK.
Vivien Chan
Dr., she/they
I am a design historian, educator, writer, and imagemaker based in the UK.I research design history and material culture in Hong Kong with a broad interest in design and the everyday. From 2025-26 I was an Asia in the World Fellow at the International Institute of Asian Studies, Leiden University, during which I was a visiting scholar at the Institut Francais Pondicherry, India. From 2023-25, I was a History Workshop Editorial Fellow, and an Honorary Fellow at the Raphael Samuel History Centre, Birkbeck, University of London. I teach illustration and design research at Nottingham Trent University and have guest lectured at the Royal College of Art, Camberwell College of Art, Kingston School of Art and Academy of Visual Art at Baptist University Hong Kong.
In 2025, I founded Out of Practice, a reading room and design research studio in the People’s Hall in Nottingham. Find out more through my newsletter and on Instagram.
You can find me on the internet
or you can email me at vc[at]vivienchan.co.uk
︎ ︎ ︎ ︎
I am a design historian, educator, writer, and imagemaker based in the UK.I research design history and material culture in Hong Kong with a broad interest in design and the everyday. From 2025-26 I was an Asia in the World Fellow at the International Institute of Asian Studies, Leiden University, during which I was a visiting scholar at the Institut Francais Pondicherry, India. From 2023-25, I was a History Workshop Editorial Fellow, and an Honorary Fellow at the Raphael Samuel History Centre, Birkbeck, University of London. I teach illustration and design research at Nottingham Trent University and have guest lectured at the Royal College of Art, Camberwell College of Art, Kingston School of Art and Academy of Visual Art at Baptist University Hong Kong.
In 2025, I founded Out of Practice, a reading room and design research studio in the People’s Hall in Nottingham. Find out more through my newsletter and on Instagram.
You can find me on the internet
or you can email me at vc[at]vivienchan.co.uk
︎ ︎ ︎ ︎
portrait by Rachel Meng Man, 2023.
Selected writing:
Race & Design, ed. Davinia Gregory-Kameka and Sabrina Rahman, ‘Squatters’ rites: ‘anti-design’ and the body at the dai pai dong in Hong Kong’, Routledge, 2026 (forthcoming)
‘To leave is to arrive (cast your net)’ in Az Crawford, The Pattern of Life: Enid Marx and Modern British Design, exhibition catalogue, July 2026
Digest, ed. Holly Eliza Temple, ‘Chew’, April 2026
‘Leftover:what remains’, as part of Dregs: Soup without Water, an exhibition by Biyi Zhu, OxWarehouse Macau, February 2026
History Workshop, ‘Illustrating History from Below’, January 2026
History Workshop, ‘Radical Synergies’, January 2026
Typesetter, ‘Modular Market, Everyday Experience, and the Movement of Diversified Historiographies—An Interview with Vivien Chan’(interview), December 2025
Barkle & Tranklements: Art Writing from the Midlands, ed.Benjamin Barra and Lesley Guy, ‘Culture at the Centre: a diasporic point of view’, Corridor8, 2025
Corridor8, ‘Maia Ruth Lee, Human Life in Motion’, Primary, exhibition review, April 2025
Corridor 8, ‘There is nothing old under the sun: an interview with Steph Huang’(interview), April 2025
Short Eats, ed. Nicole Tan, ‘Catch of the Day’ March 2025
History Workshop, ‘From Place to Place’ series introduction, January 2025 (series editor)
‘Fragments for another reality’, Jas Singh, accompanying text for exhibition 1984, Phoenix, Leicester, December 2024
Filler zine #8: Kitchens,’Appliance’, November 2024
Corridor8,‘Steph Huang: there is nothing old under the sun’, esea contemporary, exhibition review, November 2024
Archivio #10: Design, Archiving Archiving (interview), September 2024
Meritalia Magazine, ‘Decomposure’, ed. by Andrea Foffa and Marta Franceschini, April 2024
CONGEE Zine, ‘Ad Hoc Juk’, August 2023, in collaboration with artist Alastair Kwan and F.A.T. Studio
Fortified Gazette, 13th- 17th September 2022, peeling prawns; repetoires and gifts; here, a Nutrigrain bar; gravy; fervour/flavour
Urban History, April 2022,‘Markets made modular:constructing the modern ‘wet’ market in Hong Kong’s public housing estates’︎ Shortlisted on the Hong Kong Studies IBP 2023
Podcasts/videos:Off Margin Season 3 Episode 3, 6th October
The last of Hong Kong’s street food rebels, SCMP
Reverberations
Women read
Race & Design, ed. Davinia Gregory-Kameka and Sabrina Rahman, ‘Squatters’ rites: ‘anti-design’ and the body at the dai pai dong in Hong Kong’, Routledge, 2026 (forthcoming)
‘To leave is to arrive (cast your net)’ in Az Crawford, The Pattern of Life: Enid Marx and Modern British Design, exhibition catalogue, July 2026
Digest, ed. Holly Eliza Temple, ‘Chew’, April 2026
‘Leftover:what remains’, as part of Dregs: Soup without Water, an exhibition by Biyi Zhu, OxWarehouse Macau, February 2026
History Workshop, ‘Illustrating History from Below’, January 2026
History Workshop, ‘Radical Synergies’, January 2026
Typesetter, ‘Modular Market, Everyday Experience, and the Movement of Diversified Historiographies—An Interview with Vivien Chan’(interview), December 2025
Barkle & Tranklements: Art Writing from the Midlands, ed.Benjamin Barra and Lesley Guy, ‘Culture at the Centre: a diasporic point of view’, Corridor8, 2025
Corridor8, ‘Maia Ruth Lee, Human Life in Motion’, Primary, exhibition review, April 2025
Corridor 8, ‘There is nothing old under the sun: an interview with Steph Huang’(interview), April 2025
Short Eats, ed. Nicole Tan, ‘Catch of the Day’ March 2025
History Workshop, ‘From Place to Place’ series introduction, January 2025 (series editor)
‘Fragments for another reality’, Jas Singh, accompanying text for exhibition 1984, Phoenix, Leicester, December 2024
Filler zine #8: Kitchens,’Appliance’, November 2024
Corridor8,‘Steph Huang: there is nothing old under the sun’, esea contemporary, exhibition review, November 2024
Archivio #10: Design, Archiving Archiving (interview), September 2024
Meritalia Magazine, ‘Decomposure’, ed. by Andrea Foffa and Marta Franceschini, April 2024
CONGEE Zine, ‘Ad Hoc Juk’, August 2023, in collaboration with artist Alastair Kwan and F.A.T. Studio
Fortified Gazette, 13th- 17th September 2022, peeling prawns; repetoires and gifts; here, a Nutrigrain bar; gravy; fervour/flavour
Urban History, April 2022,‘Markets made modular:constructing the modern ‘wet’ market in Hong Kong’s public housing estates’︎ Shortlisted on the Hong Kong Studies IBP 2023
Podcasts/videos:Off Margin Season 3 Episode 3, 6th October
The last of Hong Kong’s street food rebels, SCMP
Reverberations
Women read
Academic lectures, conferences and workshops:
Out of Focus, Out of Practice (keynote), Failure and Resistance, Illustration Research Symposium 16, 13-14th November 2026 (forthcoming)
MA GDC Talks, Global Perspectives on Graphic Design Practice, October 2026
Asia in the World: Knowledge on the Move,IIAS, Leiden University, September 2026
‘How to buy a fish:bodies and commodities in Hong Kong’s wet markets’, IFP Monday Colloquium, French Institute Pondicherry, June 2026
‘Archiving Archiving’, presented with Zara Arshad, RMIT School of Design, Melbourne, May 2026
‘Making the Street’, Cultural Anthropology, University Padjadjaran, Bandung Indonesia, May 2026
‘Corridor kitchens, mushroom pavilions: foodscapes of cooked food hawkers in post-war Hong Kong’, Foodscaping Asia II: Metropolis, ICAS 13 Crossways of Knowledge, Surabaya, Indonesia, July 2024
dressing eating living moving workshop (co-convenor), ICAS 13 Crossways of Knowledge, Surabaya, Indonesia, July 2024
‘Exhibiting Spatial Histories: Design History and Cross-cultural Spatial Narratives of Hong Kong' panel (co-convenor), Workshop on Hong Kong Cultures, Arts and Languages in the UK, University of Sheffield, June 2024
HKSA Annual Conference, University of Sheffield, May 2024
‘The Pitch and the Module: hawkers and markets in designing post-war Hong Kong's New Towns public housing estates’, Universität Wien, April 2024
‘Hidden Histories’ workshop, University of Nottingham, March 2024
'Everyday rituals in the British Empire and after' workshop, University of Nottingham, June 2023
Disclosing Architecture, Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam,November 2022
‘Archival Interference: Counter-archives and Design History in Asia’, Archival Interactions Symposium, DAS Amsterdam, June 2022
Other speaking events:
Out of Practice, Notts Zine Fest, October 2026
The Hawker Library, IIAS, Leiden University, September 2026
The People’s Design School:A short history of design in Nottingham, The People’s Hall, September 2025
(History of) Having -> (Designing) Being, Creative Voice deTour 2024, PMQ Hong Kong, December 2024
Beyond the Egg Tart:Everyday perspectives of Hong Kong visual culture, Romance in the Mundane Roundtable Talks, Gathering Leaves, September 2024
University of Nottingham Humanities delegation, University of Adelaide, November 2023
Introduction to Girl’s School by Lee Mimi, Queer East, Broadway Cinema, Nottingham, November 2022
Out of Focus, Out of Practice (keynote), Failure and Resistance, Illustration Research Symposium 16, 13-14th November 2026 (forthcoming)
MA GDC Talks, Global Perspectives on Graphic Design Practice, October 2026
Asia in the World: Knowledge on the Move,IIAS, Leiden University, September 2026
‘How to buy a fish:bodies and commodities in Hong Kong’s wet markets’, IFP Monday Colloquium, French Institute Pondicherry, June 2026
‘Archiving Archiving’, presented with Zara Arshad, RMIT School of Design, Melbourne, May 2026
‘Making the Street’, Cultural Anthropology, University Padjadjaran, Bandung Indonesia, May 2026
‘Corridor kitchens, mushroom pavilions: foodscapes of cooked food hawkers in post-war Hong Kong’, Foodscaping Asia II: Metropolis, ICAS 13 Crossways of Knowledge, Surabaya, Indonesia, July 2024
dressing eating living moving workshop (co-convenor), ICAS 13 Crossways of Knowledge, Surabaya, Indonesia, July 2024
‘Exhibiting Spatial Histories: Design History and Cross-cultural Spatial Narratives of Hong Kong' panel (co-convenor), Workshop on Hong Kong Cultures, Arts and Languages in the UK, University of Sheffield, June 2024
HKSA Annual Conference, University of Sheffield, May 2024
‘The Pitch and the Module: hawkers and markets in designing post-war Hong Kong's New Towns public housing estates’, Universität Wien, April 2024
‘Hidden Histories’ workshop, University of Nottingham, March 2024
'Everyday rituals in the British Empire and after' workshop, University of Nottingham, June 2023
Disclosing Architecture, Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam,November 2022
‘Archival Interference: Counter-archives and Design History in Asia’, Archival Interactions Symposium, DAS Amsterdam, June 2022
Other speaking events:
Out of Practice, Notts Zine Fest, October 2026
The Hawker Library, IIAS, Leiden University, September 2026
The People’s Design School:A short history of design in Nottingham, The People’s Hall, September 2025
(History of) Having -> (Designing) Being, Creative Voice deTour 2024, PMQ Hong Kong, December 2024
Beyond the Egg Tart:Everyday perspectives of Hong Kong visual culture, Romance in the Mundane Roundtable Talks, Gathering Leaves, September 2024
University of Nottingham Humanities delegation, University of Adelaide, November 2023
Introduction to Girl’s School by Lee Mimi, Queer East, Broadway Cinema, Nottingham, November 2022