An architectural bridge between two worlds

For Sandi, cultural exchange is not an ornamental addition to international relations. It is part of how people come to understand one another.

Suzhou remains central to that understanding. The city is not merely the setting in which the Pei family's architectural story happens to intersect. It is part of the cultural inheritance from which that story emerged.

Sandi and his elder brother, Chien Chung (Didi) Pei, worked closely with their father on Suzhou Museum and saw the project through to completion. Twenty years later, the building has become a tangible continuation of that family connection.

"It's a continuation of the family carrying it on into the next generation," Sandi says.

Now the next generation is walking through Suzhou with him.

Anna's relationship with the family legacy is different from her father's. She is not yet defining herself through a particular architectural role. Instead, she has spent years working with her grandfather's archives, gradually discovering the person behind the public figure through letters, photographs and everyday objects.

The work has changed the way she thinks about inheritance. A legacy is not preserved only in monuments. Sometimes it survives in the smallest traces of a life — things that require patience and attention to understand.

"I'm still learning what my vehicle will be," Anna says.