Art / Food / Culture / Past / Current / Future
Who am I?
Human Name:
Will,Xiefengwei
Human Name:
Will,Xiefengwei
My journey has taken me through some of the world's most inspiring kitchens, from Quintonil to Alchemist and Gaggan.
What really drives me is exploring how food and culture connect, discovering those shared threads between what we eat and who we are.Through my travels and experiences, I'm trying to express these connections in my own way, and hopefully help explore new possibilities for what Chinese culture can become, both today and in the future.
A Letter from Will
The more great kitchens around the world I visit, the clearer it becomes that a restaurant can act as a medium—one that shapes a region, shapes culture, even shapes humanity. And precisely because I’ve been to many countries and met so many people and civilizations, I’ve come to see how little the world beyond China truly understands China.
I still believe China is, today, one of the most ancient, profound, and complex cultures on earth. Culture cannot be conveyed only through local ingredients; much of its beauty lies in materials and practices that have been shaped over time by place and people. Chinese culture lacks certain channels through which it can be broadly projected and communicated; dining is one of those channels. Through a restaurant’s reach, its ideas can be carried to any corner of the world.
I want my restaurant to become the most influential in all of Asia, and one of the very best in the world. Through the medium of hospitality I hope to inspire more peers to explore Chinese civilization: to uncover it, to understand it, to transform it, and to carry it forward. I want to influence diners from many fields and invite them to take meaningful action together.
Why must so many cultural practices with histories of a thousand years disappear in our generation? How many cultural essences will be locked forever behind museum glass?
At the core of the Unseenland project and of the restaurant is the direct relationship between people—people of the project, people in the space, people behind the ingredients, people behind the culture. People are the strong bonds of Chinese culture, yet why is contemporary society shrouded in indifference?
It is a restaurant—but it is more than a restaurant. When guests are guided into our space, they set aside external distractions and, with open hearts, explore the world we present. Freed to think, different individuals form diverse understandings, and they bring those new insights back into the world for a second, deeper reckoning.
In future, Unseenland will be an organization: a place where friends from many places who share convictions and ideas can meet—where minds, souls, and resources collide. Together we will speak across past, present, and future. I want to truly explore the local, to enter into real dialogue with it, to probe its future possibilities, and to spread elements of Chinese civilization at home and to the world.