“Every tree and plant in the meadow seemed to be dancing, those which average eyes would see as fixed and still.”

When I was a child, my grandparents used to tell me tales about tribes that would travel to their village in India, carrying with them their families, livelihoods, and homes, only to move again in a couple of weeks, leaving nothing but footsteps. I was fascinated, and always thought about these tribes having a life so large it could be established anywhere – across towns, countries, and even borders.

This Wood issue encapsulates these lives led by the nomads of Asia, stories of powerful women, and a look at the unprecedented challenges facing China and the wider region due to the coronavirus pandemic. We have taken the element through its numerous definitions: growth and being, its physical properties, its shapes and forms, and its symbolism.

Because just like bamboo, so symbolic of the wood element, we bend, we twist, but we never break.