From the Beauty of Place to the Bonds Between People and Home

Why We Founded WAVE in 2020

When I founded WAVE in 2020, the idea was remarkably simple.

I was moved by the beauty of Taiwan’s places—the scale of a street, the texture of a settlement, the everyday exchanges between neighbours, and the distinctive character shaped by time. I hoped to make place-based work my profession and contribute, in my own way, to revealing and sustaining the richness of local life across Taiwan.

As we ventured further into this work and met more residents, young people, and local practitioners, I began to recognise that Taiwan’s places were confronting challenges far more profound than population decline or economic stagnation.

Over-urbanisation is reshaping how resources and opportunities are distributed. Across northern and southern Taiwan alike, people are witnessing the concentration of population and capital in a small number of cities, the gradual withdrawal of essential services, the erosion of housing rights, and soaring property prices that make it increasingly difficult to build a secure life.

The disappearance of a place does not occur only when a building is demolished or a familiar shop closes. It also unfolds quietly: when recognisable landscapes are altered, when collective memories are left without successors, and when people gradually become unable to recognise the place they once called home.

These changes leave traces within us.

When people remain physically present in their hometown yet begin to lose their sense of familiarity, belonging, and agency, the resulting grief and powerlessness can develop into a persistent form of psychological distress. This experience rarely has a clear name and seldom enters public discussion, yet it is quietly embedded in the lives of many people in Taiwan.

In 2025, WAVE therefore made a more deliberate commitment to local psychological security, the preservation of everyday histories and collective memory, and the development of youth training programmes. We enter streets and communities to document how places are changing, understand how residents experience those changes, and support young people in learning how to read a place, form relationships, and translate subtle yet genuine experiences into a public language that society can recognise.

This work sustains a place’s capacity to remain alive and understand itself. It also strengthens the emotional bonds between people and their hometowns. When memories can still be told, lived experiences can still be heard, and young people remain willing to enter and engage with local communities, a place becomes more than a past waiting to be preserved. It can continue to be a ground from which people imagine their shared future.

This journey has also clarified why WAVE must deepen its international partnerships.

The concentration of people and capital, the homogenisation of everyday life through technology, and the cultural dislocation and psychological strain produced by rapid urbanisation are emerging as shared global challenges. More people are living in increasingly similar yet fragmented environments, watching familiar places recede without having the language or means to understand and respond to that loss.

Taiwan’s local experiences deserve to become part of this international conversation. At the same time, knowledge and practices developed elsewhere can help us understand our own circumstances more deeply. WAVE seeks to serve as a bridge—positioning Taiwan as a field for shared inquiry and action, connecting experiences across places, and working with international partners to explore possible responses to urbanisation and the disappearance of home.

Since 2020, WAVE has grown from a simple affection for the beauty of place into a commitment to protecting the relationships between people and the places they call home. The scale of our concern has expanded, yet the original intention remains.

We still believe in the beauty of places. Today, however, we understand more clearly that beauty must be recognised, memory must be carried forward, and belonging must be cared for collectively.

As a non-governmental organisation, WAVE will continue to bring greater attention to the cultural and psychological consequences of place loss. Through research, storytelling, youth empowerment, and place-based practice, we will work alongside residents, civil society organisations, researchers, governments, businesses, and international partners—to understand together, plan together, and protect the possibility that everyone may continue to find a place for themselves within the landscape they call home.

FOUNDER

CHO-YUN, HUANG Trester