Time's ticking

Christine Cayol founded the Paris-based firm Synthesis in 1994. Since 2003 she has lived in Beijing, where she created Yishu 8 - a Chinese incarnation of the Villa Medicis, where artists develop their talents. Her most recent book Pourquoi les Chinois ont-ils le Temps? (Why Do the Chinese Have Time?), she shows us how to turn the clock into an ally by drawing inspiration from the Chinese perception of time

With all you've got going on, how did you find the time to write a book about time?

Living in Beijing, it became apparent to me that most of the difficulties, obstacles and problems that we (non-Chinese) encounter with the Chinese came down to the relationship with time. Sometimes we find them too slow, while they feel that we go too fast - and sometimes it's the other way round. We can't seem to get the time right for one another!