Pan Yi Cheng’s propensity to search for the existential crisis – and even looks at himself from that lens – is the essence and genesis of Produce, the design studio and prototyping workshop he founded in 2013. The design studio’s claim to fame is its award-winning plywood pavilions for Xtra’s Herman Miller shop-in-shop. The first version won the Best Retail Building award at the World Architecture Festival of 2012 and the second pavilion was named World Interior of the Year at the Festival of Interiors in 2017. Produce’s body of works also include designs for the Wild Rocket and Kki restaurants, as well as landed properties. Having started with “very, very, very small objects” and seen how small parts fit together into the bigger whole, Yi Cheng says they are now ready for bigger projects like master planning and urban design. Yi Cheng graduated with honours at the Architectural Association in London in 2006 and accumulated years of experience in the field of architecture and academia working with renown international firms like Arup Advanced Geometry Unit, TP Bennett, Serie Architects and UNStudio before moving back to Singapore to set up shop in 2010.