Design Better
222 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 3 hours ago - ★★★★★ - 286 ratingsDesign Better co-hosts Eli Woolery and Aarron Walter explore the intersection of design, technology, and the creative process through conversations with inspiring guests across many creative fields. Whether you’re design curious or a design pro, Design Better is guaranteed to inspire and inform. Episodes are released semi-weekly. Vanity Fair calls Design Better, “sharp, to the point, and full of incredibly valuable information for anyone looking to better understand how to build a more innovative world.”
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Episodes
Rewind: Sara Seager: Astrophysicist pushing the boundaries of collaboration while discovering exoplanets
July 03, 2024 16:17 - 39 minutesFind full show notes, bonus content and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/rewind-sara-seager It’s a holiday week—happy 4th of July to those celebrating it 🎆—so we’re rewinding to one of our favorite episodes. NASA has been making a lot of headlines with the discovery of planets outside of our solar system that may harbor life, and our guest, Sara Seager, is a big part of these pioneering projects. While we have you here, make sure to check out some of our upcoming worksh...
Carissa Carter and Scott Doorley: Assembling Tomorrow
June 25, 2024 14:00 - 51 minutesFind show notes, transcripts, and bonus content on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/carissa-carter-scott-doorley Most of us are too busy with the present to think far into the future—work, kids, pets and other obligations can make it feel like planning for anything more than a week away is a fool’s errand. But we also live in a time of rapid change, where technologies from biological design to artificial intelligence threaten to mold the future in ways we might have trouble ima...
Celene Aubry: 100+ years of designing for legendary musicians at Hatch Show Print
June 18, 2024 14:30 - 18 minutesGet access to the full episode on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/celene-aubry Back in 2010, Aarron visited Hatch Show Print, a small print shop with a storied history that began in 1879. Hand cut wood block type and illustrations filled the shelves around presses busy producing posters for famous bands and artists. Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, and so many other legendary folks have used Hatch Show Print to promote their tours, and their aesthetic has b...
Special Episode: "Say More" Feed Drop from The Boston Globe with guest Cal Newport
June 14, 2024 20:45 - 27 minutesHey, everybody. We're sharing something special today from our pals over at the Say More podcast, where in a special series, Boston Globe columnist Shirley Leung is opening up the conversation about stress and burnout to help listeners feel less alone and inspired to get help. She connects with experts like Krista Tippett and Emily Nagoski, who use medical science, social science, and philosophy to answer deep questions about how stress works on our bodies and our minds so we can work better ...
Hillary Coe: Emmy Award-winning designer, certified commercial pilot, astronaut candidate, and drag-racing record holder on designing for SpaceX and Vast
June 11, 2024 14:30 - 1 hourVisit our Substack for a video of the live interview, transcript, and more: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/hillary-coe This is our 100th episode of Design Better. 🥳 It’s an amazing milestone! Whether you’ve been with us for years or you’re brand new to the show, thanks for listening and supporting our work. We saved something very special for our 100th episode: a live episode with Hillary Coe, formerly a design leader at SpaceX who is now leading design at Vast, who are building commercial...
Bonus: AI and the Creative Process
June 04, 2024 14:11 - 1 hourGenerative AI is finding its way into the tools and processes that power creative work. Exciting? Terrifying? Maybe a little of both. Adobe has been not only shipping impressive generative AI tools and features, but thinking about the implications this new technology could have on creative careers. Adobe invited us to their offices in San Francisco for a conversation with a panel of leaders including Rachana Rele, Samantha Warren, Danielle Morimoto, and Laura Herman who shared how they and t...
Ben Clymer: Hodinkee founder on watch design and creating a compelling content brand
May 28, 2024 13:20 - 14 minutesGet access to the full episode on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/ben-clymer Aarron fell down a rabbit hole when the Apple Watch came out. He knew nothing about watches, their design history and the immense investment of human effort it’s taken to engineer accurate timepieces until he bought an Apple Watch. He loves wearing a watch, but notifications and tracking caused him to abandon it for something simpler and mechanical. Anyone curious about watches will inevitably end up ...
Natsai Audrey Chieza: Designing with biology
May 21, 2024 13:50 - 40 minutesView show notes, transcript, and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/natsai-audrey-chieza Steve Jobs perfectly described the creative process when he said, “Creativity is just connecting the dots”. Innovation and new ideas are often found by combining the familiar in new ways. Natsai Audrey Chieza, founder of Faber Futures, is doing just that. Natsai started her education as an architect, became fascinated by materials and transferred into biology, and today is designing ...
Pablo Stanley: A creative force of nature on the importance persistence and hustle
May 14, 2024 11:00 - 20 minutesGet access to the full episode, show notes, transcript and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/pablo-stanley Pablo Stanley’s creativity seemingly knows no bounds. Constant doodling is a key to his creative process, and has spawned countless projects including web comics like The Design Team and Stanley and Rupert, an illustration generation platform called Blush, and most recently Bueno, a platform that lets people build virtual worlds. Pablo makes us all feel like slacker...
Tasha Golden: Avoiding burnout while pursuing creativity with passion
May 07, 2024 11:00 - 42 minutesFind full show notes, transcript, and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/tasha-golden As designers and creatives, we often find our work to be meaningful and fulfilling. But creativity can also come at a price. There can be a danger of burning out when we pursue creativity with passion, and our guest today, Tasha Golden, has experienced this herself. She lost her music career as a touring songwriter due to severe burnout and depression, and now researches well-being, how ...
Jonathan Adler: Famed potter and designer on bringing creativity into all aspects of life
April 30, 2024 13:00 - 13 minutesVisit our Substack to get access to the full show: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/jonathan-adler We’ve admired Jonathan Adler’s work for a long time. Though he started his career as a potter, today he designs sumptuous furnishings and interiors that inject energy and joy into everyday life. His work is decadent but not frumpy and always delivered with a winking sense of humor. If anyone truly knows how to bring creativity into all aspects of life, it’s Jonathan Adler. We speak with Jonatha...
Making Design Better—better—with weekly episodes, an enhanced newsletter, and more
April 24, 2024 16:00 - 5 minutesTldr; We’re transitioning to weekly episode releases, publishing an enhanced newsletter, and simplifying our premium subscription which will now be on Substack. Read the details below … Upgrade to paid Weekly episodes For years, we’ve been on a semi-weekly cadence for new episodes, but this schedule is proving too limiting for the amount of interviews we’re producing. Starting today, we’re shifting to a weekly release schedule for our premium subscribers who will receive a new episode every T...
Brian Tyler, composer for Yellowstone, Crazy Rich Asians, Mario Brothers, and more, on his creative process
April 09, 2024 11:00 - 44 minutesFind the transcript, full show notes, and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/brian-tyler Our conversation today takes us further into the creative process across different mediums. If you’re a fan of Yellowstone, Crazy Rich Asians, Iron Man 3, or the recent Mario Brothers movie, then chances are good that one of the soundtrack clips in the trailer below is familiar to you. And today on Design Better we speak with the person behind them all: Emmy-award nominated composer B...
Bonus: Eric Snowden, Head of Adobe Design, on AI + Design
April 02, 2024 18:49 - 49 minutesFind the transcript, show notes, and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/eric-snowden Adobe has been the big wrench in our creative toolbox for decades. But there’s a new tool shaking up our workflow —Generative AI. Eric Snowden, leader of Adobe’s design team, sees a big opportunity for designers to extend and enhance the creative process by folding generative AI into each of our tools and we wanted to get his take on what’s around the corner. We spoke with Eric about his...
Kate Aronowitz: Shaping the story of design in business
March 26, 2024 19:30 - 51 minutesVisit our Substack for transcript, show notes, and more: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/kate-aronowitz Few designers have an instinct for business fundamentals. Those that do are able to position design as a competitive advantage for a business and pave the way for design teams to collaborate more effectively. Kate Aronowitz is one of those rare birds. Kate has held high level design roles at LinkedIn, WealthFront, Facebook, eBay, and today she’s at GV (formerly known as Google Ventures),...
Ellen Lupton: Thinking With Type
March 13, 2024 13:31 - 43 minutesFor decades, graphic designers have been introduced to typography by Ellen Lupton’s book, Thinking With Type. It was certainly a staple in Aarron’s courses when he taught graphic design. It’s now in its third edition, with loads of new content. It’s worth noting, the layout of each page of this book is beautiful and entirely designed by Ellen herself. We chat with Ellen about what’s new in this edition of her book, and how people other than designers can use it. We also go through some rapid...
Jonathan Hoefler: Typography legend on type history, philosophy, and entrepreneurship
February 27, 2024 12:00 - 1 hourVisit our Substack for the transcript, additional show notes and links, and more: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/jonathan-hoefler Chances are you have a few fonts on your computer designed by Jonathan Hoefler. Since 1991, Apple has included Hoefler Text on every Mac. Ideal Sans, Knockout, Archer, Verlag, and Sentinel—are a few more of Hoefler’s well known typefaces —each is steeped in history and timelessly beautiful. It’s no wonder that Jonathan was featured in the Netflix series Abstract...
Bonus: Hamish Smyth of Standards
February 25, 2024 16:36 - 42 minutesVisit our Substack for the transcript, links, and more: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/hamish-smyth Design systems have been on the minds of those of us in the software industry for more than a decade now and for good reason. To create large scale software with a consistent experience, standards are needed to guide contributors. This is not a new problem, though. Before software designers created design systems, brand and print designers created design standards to guide creative collabor...
Bonus: Hiroki Asai, Global Head of Marketing at Airbnb
February 06, 2024 20:43 - 52 minutesFind a transcript and more show notes on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/hiroki-asai Airbnb and Apple have a few things in common: They’re both design-centric companies, they sell products through best-in-class marketing, and they’ve achieved incredible success by focusing on the customer. There’s one more thing they have in common—Hiroki Asai who currently leads marketing at Airbnb and formerly led marketing at Apple during their most historic product launches. We spoke with ...
Vanessa Gennarelli: Surviving Change at Work
January 30, 2024 16:53 - 52 minutesFind the transcript and full show notes on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/vanessa-gennarelli Change at work is tough, and it’s seemingly constant. New leadership, new boss, new role, new responsibilities, new strategies. Suddenly, everything you thought was certain has been upended and you’re left fretting about what’s next. Though change at work is a constant, the stress and confusion it often induces doesn’t have to be. Our guest today is Vanessa Gennarelli, author of Surv...
Scott Rice: Creative lessons learned teaching film with Matthew McConaughey
January 16, 2024 12:00 - 49 minutesWith a more than 100 year history, movie making has a lot to teach us about collaboration and creativity in complex environments. How do directors bring together so many people with such different skills for months, sometimes years, to make a movie that holds together as a story that entertains and makes a profit? That’s exactly what we asked Scott Rice, an Emmy-award winning film and television director, who has been teaching film at the University of Texas at Austin for 25 years. He teaches...
Autumn Durald Arkapaw: Cinematographer for Wakanda Forever and Loki on the overlap between design and photography
January 02, 2024 19:04 - 57 minutesFind more show notes and the transcript on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/autumn-durald-arkapaw-cinematographer The Marvel Cinematic Universe has dominated the box office and streaming platforms for years, and our guest, Autumn Durald Arkapaw, has played a significant role in shaping the look of the series. Autumn was the cinematographer for Wakanda Forever—the critically acclaimed second Black Panther film—the series Loki released on Disney+, along with a documentary on the ...
Rewind: Midcentury modern design principles and Heath Ceramics
December 26, 2023 15:00 - 41 minutesWe hope that you’re having a festive holiday season, and that you’re able to take some time off to be with friends and family. Today we’re rewinding to our interview with Robin Petravic, co-owner of Heath Ceramics. We love Heath Ceramics. They're the types of objects you pass on from generation to generation, the kind of gift you bring to a wedding, or the dishes that you'd want to put on a beautiful holiday table. Speaking of which, If you have a little holiday money to spend, you can suppor...
Barry Katz: The history and philosophy of design in Silicon Valley and beyond
December 19, 2023 15:46 - 58 minutesFind the transcript, show notes, and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/barry-katz We bet you don’t know where the term “interaction design” comes from, but Barry Katz does. Katz’s book, Make It New, captures the lost history of digital design that should be required reading for all in the software design industry. Eli first got to know Barry Katz as a professor at Stanford during his undergrad education in product design, where Barry taught one of his favorite classes: T...
Bonus Episode: Dorrian Porter, CEO of Vestaboard
December 18, 2023 15:24 - 42 minutesFind the transcript, show notes, and more on our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/dorrian-porter-vestaboard The sound and movement of a split flap display mesmerizes us like few things can. There’s a charm to these things. Travelers linger in front of them in train stations anticipating new information, happy to stick around to watch the magic. Dorrian Porter’s encounter with a split flap display in Paris inspired a product idea that would later turn into a company—Vestaboard. In o...
Paola Antonelli: How design shapes culture
November 28, 2023 15:10 - 1 hourFind show notes, transcripts, and more at https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/paola-antonelli The Museum of Modern Art brings to mind images of Van Gough’s Starry Night, Salvador Dali’s Persistence of Memory, and Andy Warhol’s Campbell Soup Cans. But thanks to Paola Antonelli, senior curator in the Department of Architecture and Design, MoMA exhibitions also encompass the role design has played in shaping culture and the human experience. We talk with Paola about how we can look at digital des...
Design Better Holiday Gift Guide
November 22, 2023 16:14 - 53 minutesAs designers, we can’t help but be particular about the gifts we give and receive. We’ve put together a list of beautiful and useful gifts at varying price ranges to help you satisfy everyone on your holiday shopping list this year, including yourself. Wishing you and yours a happy, safe holiday season filled with love, gratitude, and connection. Your pals, Aarron and Eli *** For the full gift guide, visit our Substack: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/design-better-holiday-gift-guide#detail...
Tycho: The soundtrack for creative work
November 21, 2023 09:00 - 57 minutesFind the episode transcript and show notes on designbetterpodcast.com Our show starts with a little sample of the music that fuels our creative work. Eli’s been listening to Tycho, aka Scott Hansen, since 2006. It just happened to coincide with the first time he took the leap into being a creative entrepreneur, starting his own small design consultancy as well as co-founding a magazine about underwater photography. Tycho’s music was a constant, motivating soundtrack to his work, and it has be...
Bonus Episode: Gil Gershoni on Dyslexic Design Thinking
November 17, 2023 21:17 - 46 minutesFind the transcript and episode notes here: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/gil-gershoni#details October is dyslexia awareness month, and we were recently introduced to Gil Gershoni, who is on a mission to help us all recognize dyslexia as a creative superpower. Gershoni runs an influential agency that’s been reshaping brands with the power of dyslexic design thinking for decades. One in five people have dyslexia, and there are many other kinds of neurodivergent thinkers out there. We hope ...
OK Go: Making the impossible possible
November 08, 2023 17:13 - 58 minutesShow notes and transcript: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/ok-go Not many bands hire Russian pilots to film a Zero-G video on their cosmonaut training plane, known as the “vomit comet”. But those are the kinds of extremes that OK Go will go to in the pursuit of creativity. Tim Nordwind and Damien Kulash, the band’s founders, met at camp as pre-teens in search of a fellow creative nerd, and founded the band in 1998. Over the past 25 years, they’ve created 3 Grammy-nominated music videos, and...
Announcing something new…
November 01, 2023 15:06 - 3 minutesOver the seven years doing the show, we noticed a pattern in those who achieve their career goals fastest—they consciously invest in themselves by building skills and knowledge. And one of the best ways to learn is to have direct access to people who inform and inspire. Today, we’re launching a premium service called DB+ designed to help you learn faster and grow your career. Subscribers to the Power Listener plan get access to episodes ad-free and a week before everyone else for the price of...
Paula Scher: Pentagram legend on design, persuasion & embracing mistakes
October 25, 2023 14:19 - 42 minutesAarron first met Paula Scher as a grad student in Philadelphia. He worked at the Temple University gallery and was hanging an exhibition of her posters when they first spoke about her work. He didn’t know at the time how significant her influence on graphic design was, but her work made an impression on him. Paula’s work and kinetic typography sits in the canon of graphic design history. Described as the “master conjurer of the instantly familiar,” Scher straddles the line between pop culture...
Bonus Episode: Matt D Smith from Shift Nudge on the elements of a great user interface
October 19, 2023 20:24 - 1 hourShow notes and transcript: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/bonus-episode-matt-d-smith#details We’ve got a special bonus episode for you today. Matt D. Smith, better known as MDS, is the founder of Shift Nudge, and he has a mission to lead a new generation of interface designers to build the digital products of the future. Matt’s courses on Shift Nudge have helped thousands of students at top companies like Apple, Figma, Lyft, Slack, and more, learn the visual skills of interface design, eve...
Llisa Demetrios: Ray and Charles Eames's granddaughter on their legacy and influence on mid century modern design
October 10, 2023 15:20 - 53 minutesShow notes and transcript: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/llisa-demetrios#details Mid century modern design aesthetics are enduring and as relevant today as ever. Perhaps no designers influenced those philosophies more than Charles and Ray Eames whose body of work transcends media and is still being produced today. It’s hard not to think of the Eames’ as monolithic design heroes, but today we’re taking a different look at them as human beings. We’re talking with Llisa Demetrios, Chief Cur...
Bonus Episode: Bayard Winthrop, CEO of American Giant
October 04, 2023 17:22 - 55 minutesHey everybody, we have a special bonus episode for you today. We're having a conversation with Bayard Winthrop, the founder and CEO of American Giant, one of our favorite clothing companies. This episode is all about the intersection of design and entrepreneurship. Designers often hear that they need to develop business acumen: they need to know how a business works, and how a product makes money. And Bayard shares some of those insights here in our conversation. This episode is different in ...
Ed Catmull: Creative lessons from Lucasfilm to Pixar and beyond
September 27, 2023 15:30 - 1 hourWelcome to our second Design Better episode on the creative process. You may not know Ed Catmull’s name, but there’s almost no doubt you’re familiar with his work. As the co-founder of Pixar, he’s responsible for helping to create movies ranging from the original Toy Story on through The Incredibles, Wall-E, Moana, and Inside Out. Ed has a background in computer science, and as someone who pioneered many of the computer graphics and digital animation techniques that we now take for granted, ...
David Sedaris: How observation and prototyping shapes his work
September 12, 2023 08:00 - 48 minutesWelcome to the first episode in our Design Better series on the creative process. In this series, we’re going beyond the confines of design to speak with some of the most creative people in the world, to learn how they approach collaboration, come up with innovative ideas, and overcome creative obstacles. We’ll speak with guests like Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar; Autumn Durald Arkapaw, cinematographer for Loki and Wakanda Forever, and OK Go, one of the most creative bands in the world righ...
Design Better Trailer
August 24, 2023 17:52 - 1 minuteDesign Better co-hosts Eli Woolery and Aarron Walter explore the intersection of design, technology, and the creative process through conversations with inspiring guests across many creative fields. Whether you’re design curious or a design pro, Design Better is guaranteed to inspire and inform. Episodes are released semi-weekly. Vanity Fair calls Design Better, “sharp, to the point, and full of incredibly valuable information for anyone looking to better understand how to build a more innova...
Design Better's New Adventure: Exciting changes to the show
August 22, 2023 08:00 - 16 minutesWe recently hit our 100th episode, and we have a big announcement to share. If you haven't already subscribed to our Substack at https://designbetterpodcast.com/ head over there so you can stay up to day with all the latest episodes, as well as our free newsletter. Thank you for your support! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Bonus Episode with Don Norman: Panel discussion on designing a better world
August 19, 2023 10:35 - 1 hourShow notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/bonus-episode-with-don-norman-panel In this special bonus episode, renowned scholar and author Don Norman (The Design of Everyday Things, Design for a Better World) leads a discussion with recognized design leaders about how design can and should play a role in solving the biggest challenges of humanity today. This conversation was recorded at a live online event August 17, 2023 produced by the UX Design Institute. Panelists who participated in th...
Ole Lütjens: The story behind the Disney+ launch
August 08, 2023 15:03 - 52 minutesSubscribe for free to our show on Substack to receive episodes a week early, bonus content like post-show discussions, and more: https://designbetterpodcast.com/ Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/ole-lutjens-evidence-based-design What was it like to lead product design at Disney through the creation of Disney+, one of its biggest launches in the digital age? And how did a designer from Germany become a design leader for Major League Baseball, when he knew almost nothing about the...
Georg Petschnigg: Product design and storytelling at The New York Times
July 25, 2023 11:00 - 54 minutesSubscribe to the Design Better Podcast on Substack to get episodes a week early and other bonus content: https://designbetterpodcast.com/ Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/georg-petschnigg-product-design-and#details *** The New York Times has gone through many challenges and evolutions during its storied history. Founded in 1851—when it was called the New-York Daily Times—it faced draft riots during the Civil War, received the first telegraph transmission from a naval battle in 1...
Rewind: Eileen Fisher: Embracing imperfect newness
July 06, 2023 16:58 - 42 minutes - 58.9 MBHi Folks- We hope that everyone is enjoying their summer so far. We’re taking a few weeks off to be with our families, and to prepare for an exciting announcement that we plan to share soon. In the meantime, we’re rewinding to one of our favorite episodes with Eileen Fisher, founder of her eponymous fashion brand Eileen Fisher, Inc. Enjoy the episode, and we’ll see you in a few weeks. You can subscribe to our Substack to receive episodes a week early, our monthly newsletter with job oppo...
Eileen Fisher, Rewind: How design principles and systems guide a clothing company
July 06, 2023 16:58 - 42 minutesShow notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/rewind-eileen-fisher-embracing-imperfect Hi Folks- We hope that everyone is enjoying their summer so far. We’re taking a few weeks off to be with our families, and to prepare for an exciting announcement that we plan to share soon. In the meantime, we’re rewinding to one of our favorite episodes with Eileen Fisher, founder of her eponymous fashion brand Eileen Fisher, Inc. Enjoy the episode, and we’ll see you in a few weeks. You can subscribe to o...
Donna Lichaw: The leader’s journey
June 20, 2023 11:00 - 47 minutesShow notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/donna-lichaw-the-leaders-journey “Management is a job, whereas leadership is a quality you have to earn,” as we learned way back in Episode 21 from our guest Julie Zhuo. Today, we’re diving deeper into the topic of leadership with Donna Lichaw, author of the new book The Leader's Journey: Transforming Your Leadership To Achieve the Extraordinary Donna is also the author of The User's Journey: Storymapping Products That People Love. We chat with D...
Donna Lichaw: The Leader’s Journey
June 20, 2023 11:00 - 47 minutes - 67.5 MB“Management is a job, whereas leadership is a quality you have to earn,” as we learned way back in Episode 21 from our guest Julie Zhuo. Today, we’re diving deeper into the topic of leadership with Donna Lichaw, author of the new book The Leader's Journey: Transforming Your Leadership To Achieve the Extraordinary Donna is also the author of The User's Journey: Storymapping Products That People Love. We chat with Donna about why leadership often gets conflated with management, how to fin...
Robert Brunner: The design giant who hired Jony Ive
June 06, 2023 15:00 - 53 minutesShow notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/robert-brunner-where-art-and-commerce Our guest today, Robert Brunner, once joked that his tombstone will say: “Here lies the guy who hired Jonathan Ive.” But there’s much more to Robert than that. He did indeed build out the industrial design team at Apple in the 90’s, but he’s also been a partner at Pentagram Design, and was the chief designer of Beats by Dr. Dre, a brand that sold to Apple for $3 billion dollars. We talk with Robert about the a...
Robert Brunner: Where art and commerce meet
June 06, 2023 15:00 - 53 minutes - 74.7 MBOur guest today, Robert Brunner, once joked that his tombstone will say: “Here lies the guy who hired Jonathan Ive.” But there’s much more to Robert than that. He did indeed build out the industrial design team at Apple in the 90’s, but he’s also been a partner at Pentagram Design, and was the chief designer of Beats by Dr. Dre, a brand that sold to Apple for $3 billion dollars. We talk with Robert about the arc of his career, what it takes to run a successful design consulting business, a...
John Maeda: AI + Design
May 23, 2023 11:00 - 35 minutesShow notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/john-maeda-ai-design Today we welcome back John Maeda, who is currently Vice President of Design and Artificial Intelligence at Microsoft. You’re probably familiar with John’s work, but if not, take a listen to Episode 42 of this show, where he talks about the arc of his remarkable career. In today’s episode, we talk with John about his role at Microsoft, what’s most misunderstood about AI, and his optimistic take on what the future holds for desi...
Sheena Iyengar: Choose to think bigger
May 09, 2023 22:12 - 40 minutes - 56.7 MBWe may not think about it all that often, but the choices that we make often end up defining who we become. Dr. Sheena Iyengar, the S.T. Lee Professor of Business at the Columbia Business School, makes the psychology of choice and decision-making the focus of much of her research. She wrote a best-selling book called The Art of Choosing, and just published a new book called Think Bigger. We talk about Sheena’s new book, and dive into why decision-making has become a focus of her career. We...