Kevin Kwan

I've always been drawn to the Edwardian period in England. To me, it seems like such a fascinating time, when the British Empire was at the height of its powers and the strict mores of the Victorian age were dissipating into the decadence of King Edward's reign.

I go to Shenzhen, China, and am taken to a vast luxury spa with a hundred leather recliners and a hundred accompanying plasma screen televisions bolted to the ceiling.

I moved to New York and went to art school at Parsons School of Design. Became a photographer. Became a creative consultant.

I've recently rediscovered Anthony Trollope. I used to read him back in college, and a friend turned me on to a whole new series of his work, 'The Palliser Series.' It's a series of seven or eight books.

Especially in the West, people want to understand Asia on a deeper level because it's become the engine of the world economy, like it or not.

I sort of wanted to reveal this other side of Asia: Southeast Asia, where the Chinese have been wealthy for generations and have different ways of relating to money. I wanted to sort of reveal this world to readers.