Gilbert Yeung
Gilbert Yeung is the owner of local institution/nightclub Dragon-i, which celebrated its 10th anniversary last year. He talks to Andrea Lo about how partying has changed, growing up, and learning from his dad.
I was born and raised in Hong Kong until I was 13—my parents sent me to boarding school in Devon, England. So I went to boarding school for four years, then after that I went to Toronto for school and university. I came back to Hong Kong in 1991.
I didn’t know [I was going to be the owner of a nightclub]. I wish I did. I always loved entertainment, but I never knew I would be so lucky to do something that I really love—and working with great people around me.
Getting into the business wasn’t planned. From 1999 to 2003, we had a PR production company called G-Spot. At that time Hong Kong was quite boring—not too many nice spots that you could go out to.
We were doing quite a lot of parties for fashion labels, and it was very popular. Most of the fashion brands had budgets to do events and parties, and because there was a lack of entertainment that people could turn to, whenever there was a fashion party, people anticipated [it].
My father [mogul Albert Yeung] is a teacher in a lot of things. I learn a lot from him—directly, indirectly and in a strict way. Well, there is only one way—the strict and harsh way.
He would never actually tell you that he was teaching you, because he was quite old-school in that way.