ABOUT TATSU MAKER WORKS

I moved to China from the US in 2003, and Singapore has been my home since 2009. For many years in an earlier career I worked in the food industry across America and Asia-Pacific, traveling to hot dog factories, abattoirs, and nut and cheese factories in hundreds of locations across North America and from Japan to New Zealand to Sri Lanka. My love for what, how, and why people eat what they do has grown and grown.

I started Tatsu Maker Works (named for my awesome dog, Tatsu) as a way to tell my daughter’s stories through art, which she loved. When she decided she wanted to take a break (I have another 75+ stories of hers for future print fodder) and I was searching for a new direction, naturally I gravitated to Singapore hawker culture. Every place has their street foods and local cuisines, but hawker culture is special, especially from an outsider point of view.

Singapore hawker culture, bringing together the local blend of regional people, tastes, and ingredients under (literally) one roof, is the most democratic example of Singapore as a nation. On any given day you’ll find people from all walks of life sitting shoulder to shoulder enjoying their kway teow or fried carrot cake or roti prata. Local Singaporeans may not see it as so special, having grown up with it, but if a banker or backpacking visitor to this land comes for one week they will certainly be dragged somewhere for laksa or chili crab and be forever hooked.

When you think of Singapore art it’s usually colorful shophouses or a Merlion or a Boat Quay scene, but the food (the food!) doesn’t get much respect; it’s often treated as kitsch for refrigerator magnets or pencil cases.

I’ve taken on a mission to elevate this part of the Singapore story and celebrate it for a global audience. Someone arriving from Europe or the United States may have never met a Singaporean before (there just aren’t enough Singaporeans to go around!) and will have come with the impression that Singapore is clean, modern, the future, it works, which it is and does, but it’s much more than that.

If there is a national sport in Singapore it’s talking about food. Whenever people come by my studio, or I’m talking with friends, it doesn’t take long before I hear about their favorite shop for this or that, or I have to check out a certain hawker centre, and my list for more spots to check out grows longer and longer.

I hope to keep exploring this wonderful part of Singapore and singing its awesomeness for many more years.