Here Be Dragons: Exploring London's Edges

Visits to Mother London and Heatherwick Studio spark visions of possibility

Hummingbird bird and dragon (via Artiphoria)

In computer coding, the phrase “Here be dragons” refers to code that is almost impossible to understand, even for serious coders, but can have seemingly magical powers. The phrase popped into my head as I sat beneath a long Chinese paper dragon spiralling around the exposed concrete pillars of architect-designer Thomas Heatherwick’s new studio, near King’s Cross.

During a stunning breakfast session organised by Pi Capital, Heatherwick explained the genetic code underpinning his work, including the 2012 London Olympics Caldron; my favourite London bus, the revamped (but now sadly discontinued) Routemaster; and his plans for the BT Tower, which he announced at the end of his talk. The code is also articulated in his new book, Humanise, which we all walked away with a signed copy of—and is high on my reading list.

Thomas Heatherwick in full flight

One element of my 2024 “sortabbatical” involves exploring the edges of today’s system, the system we hope to change, and this week has seen a bumper crop of related adventures. Among them, thinking back to the pre-mainstreaming years, was a reunion of colleagues from SustainAbility’s pre-ERM/KKR days, convened by Peter Zollinger (now at Switzerland’s Globalance Bank) and Seb Beloe (WHEB Asset Management).

One thing that stuck in my mind from the evening was Peter’s comment about how SustainAbility (which I co-founded back in 1987) served as an incubator for hundreds of people with shared values, many of whom went on to be leaders in the wider field.

Among those at the reunion table in Portland Place were Fran(cesca) Dixon van Dijk (who, among other things, serves on the board of the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency), Jodie Thorpe (research fellow at the Institute of Development Studies), and Oliver Dudok van Heel (CISL fellow at the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership and global sustainability director at Kearney). Unsurprisingly, the subject of regeneration came up a number of times.

Speaking of which, earlier in the week I had visited Shoreditch, where I happily absorbed the street art en route. I was taking part in a meeting of a “Council of Wisdom” convened by the Blue Earth Summit group. Hosted at Mother London, we discussed trends relevant to future events, with a planned expansion to include Woolwich, in the south-east corner of London, where there are a number of ongoing urban renewal projects.

Passing shots while walking through Shoreditch

On the subject of transformation, one of the week’s stand-out moment was when Thomas Heatherwick put a round red table through its paces at his studio. As he pulled it, it stretched into a long ellipse, gliding on invisible wheels. The demonstration struck me as a wonderful metaphor for what we now must do with our economics, with our economies and, ever-more-important as creative hubs and economic engines, with our cities.

The problem, however, is that the necessary transformations do not glide on invisible wheels—indeed, they are triggering growing resistance from those who see their vested interests threatened, from fossil fuel sector investors to farmers across Europe.

Thomas Heatherwick turns a circle into an ellipse

By no means finally, Louise (Kjellerup Roper) and I spoke to John O’Brien and Lucy Knill during the week, respectively founder and CEO of Anthropy, about their plans for the event’s 2025 edition. One theme I developed in the conversation was the need to expand our collective focus of interest from brands, companies and supply chains to the dynamics and shaping of the markets they serve.

At Volans, we have often argued that a key defect of current CSR and ESG approaches is that they focus on individual companies and their supply chains, which is a bit like extracting fish from polluted waters—and then returning them clean and sparkling to the same filthy waters.

In that context, a key call this week was with Roland Kupers, currently writing a new book at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center—where I wrote much of my 2014 book, The Zeronauts, sub-titled “Breaking The Sustainability Barrier.” many moons ago, he ran Shell’s natural gas business and then became vice-president of sustainable development. Among other things, he has ben working with there Environmental Defense Fund on ways to control the world’s methane emissions.

Our conversation drew on the deep history of the chartering of limited companies, the perils of the reductionist mindset spawned by the evolution of science in the wake of the Renaissance, and the growing significance of complexity theory when dealing with the interfaces between markets and the future.

It will take me a while to process the week’s lessons and insights, but dragons continue to hover all around. Intriguingly, the symbolism associated with this mythical beast varies hugely around world. In the West, it tends to be seen as a symbol of evil, in both the chivalric and Christian traditions. In the East, by contrast, it symbolizes supernatural power, wisdom, strength, and hidden knowledge—which is the direction in which I, and I suspect Heatherwick Studio, incline.

Both interpretations are in play at the moment, however, as in our flailing efforts to slay modern dragons like the climate and biodiversity emergencies, alongside the roiling threats of region al and global conflict. At the same time, though, I now sense that—with new generations coming into the frame and novel technologies, including AI, surfacing all around—we find ourselves on the edge, the threshold, of what might jyetust prove to be a second renaissance.