HOW DID THE IDEA FOR AIR COME ABOUT?
MATT: Food is one of the only things in life that we need to survive. The fact that it’s not the most important thing we are talking about is crazy to me. In a food-loving place like Singapore, we talk about food in terms of dishes and how everyone has their favourite dishes at a specific restaurant. This is something I love and I think it’s an amazing part of Singapore’s culture. But how do we delve deeper? How do we create a community of people who are creating conversations around food? This is why Will (Goldfarb, of Room4Dessert), Ronald (Akili, of Potato Head) and I created AIR. We want to use it as a platform to create a community centred around conversations about food — where it comes from, how it’s produced, and how we can ensure that we don’t run out of it.
HOW WILL AIR DO THAT?
MATT: I think we need a place like AIR to gather all this information and distil it into a version that is, first and foremost, delicious and also fun, accessible and approachable. We want food to be exciting, energetic, interesting and engaging. It’s a conversation driven by the fact that we take for granted that we will always have food. So we have our Garden, where you can see the most basic threads of where our food comes from; our Research Space, where we can discover all the possibilities of what we can do with that produce; our Restaurant, where guests can taste the food; and our Cooking School, where you can learn how to make delicious food.
“There is a circularity to every aspect, from picking food from the ground,
learning what we can do with every part of the produce, and sharing the results at our Restaurant and Cooking School.”
IS THAT WHY AIR IS DESCRIBED AS A CIRCULAR CAMPUS?
MATT: Exactly. There is a circularity to every aspect, from picking food from the ground, learning what we can do with every part of the produce, and sharing the results at our Restaurant and Cooking School. The AIR experience is a conversation. Engaging at and with AIR creates conversations among like-minded people about food, and hopefully, that conversation spreads beyond our campus.
HOW DID WILL, RONALD AND YOU END UP STARTING AIR TOGETHER?
MATT: Will has been friends with Ronald and I for a long time. But Ronald and I only met two years ago. Will and I have talked about doing something together and when Ronald reached out to Will to tell him that he’s interested in doing something in Singapore, Will called me. Ronald wanted something centred around food in a way that it is a “universe” around this way of thinking. So Will called me and asked, “Can you be in Singapore in 48 hours? Ronald wants you to see a building.” And that’s how I flew to Singapore from Copenhagen for just 41 hours, and saw the space that is now AIR. That was in March 2022.
WHAT ARE THE UNIQUE STRENGTHS THAT YOU EACH BRING TO AIR?
MATT: Ronald and I have similar views on how we should approach life in general — me, via food, and him via hospitality and design. The core ethos at Potato Head and Amass are exactly the same; they just deal in different mediums. Will has a very holistic approach to his cooking and is the glue between Ronald and I. He has a health-conscious and medicinal approach at Room4Dessert and is very humble about his amazing waste processing and collection system that he has in Bali. He also drinks the Kool-Aid when it comes to our philosophy of whole-ingredient cooking and ensuring food sustainability for the long-term.
To visit AIR’s Research Space or to learn more about our community efforts in our Garden, email info@aircccc.com.sg.