Hey! 👋
Welcome to Kawan—our vibrant community of data heads and storytellers. We’re all about improving data literacy and sharing nuanced stories about Asia. Come hang!
what roots me to the core of this land? — issue #62
In 2013, I went to Japan for the first time, desperate for a break from stressful Singapore. But the non-stop bustle of Tokyo, with the near-identical welcoming chirp of sales people in every shop, made me feel more overwhelmed and overstimulated. Turns out what I needed wasn’t more city.
Growing Roots Through Our New Year’s Dinner Party
This past January, we hosted our new year’s dinner party, which has now become an annual tradition. When we organised the first one in 2023, we had wanted to gather our community in person for the first time at our office. As an organisation whose work—and, for that
Tips on staying sharp as a developer
Programming is not a stagnant discipline. Being a developer—in my case, a full-stack developer—means you’re always learning to keep up with…
Humans of Kontinentalist: Zenn Wong
Given our mutual enthusiasm in maps, Konti has seen our share of geography interns. Zenn shares what else an internship with us can offer.
Humans of Kontinentalist: Jasen
Back in August, we caught up with Jasen, our former editorial and development intern who called us from the other side of the world in the…
Localising climate change — issue #26
It was 2017, and I had just landed in Singapore after five years living in the United States. The thick afternoon air embraced me, then tried to squeeze the very life out of me. Welcome home, indeed. It took me months to get used to the tropics, but a thought
Where to begin? My guide to pitching a data story
I’ll be honest — three years in the field of storytelling/journalism has not made me much more confident about pitching stories than when…
Applying print principles to data visualization design
How can data viz design benefit from design theories like the Gestalt principles?
Meet the Community! Jane Zhang, data viz designer and e-commerce strategist
Jane Zhang is an independent data visualization designer based in Toronto. She’s made a name for herself with her recognisable static…
The might of small things — issue #25
When I was reading history many years ago, microhistories were one of my favourite topics. I love understanding how small things, like folklore and fairytales, reveal a lot about our past. Eventually, I wrote my Honours thesis on Singapore's national day stamps. I got a lot of laughs
Kontinentalist: Insights from user research and translating it into our new website
One fine day in mid-2019, a little more than a year after Kontinentalist first launched, some of us sat down to discuss what was in store…
Kontinentalist: Navigating our new editorial vision
Last week, Pei Ying shared how we’ve rebranded from a map-driven studio to a data-driven storytelling studio… with a fresh new look to…
Introducing the new Kontinentalist!
Hey! You've been part of our story ever since you first laid eyes on our stories—and we wanted to share with you what's been going on with the recent changes on our end. Kontinentalist has now rebranded into a data storytelling studio...with a fresh
We abandoned Wordpress to build our own CMS
Let Dylan and Rifqi, our Lead Developer and Full-stack Web Developer, tell you why. Abandon ship! To answer why, let us travel back in time to when Konti started, as Peiying mentioned in her article on our rebranding. In the early days of 2017–2018, most of what we did