The Balance of Commerce and Culture

Alex Zhang (Website, X, Instagram) is a cultural curator, community builder, and creative director. Currently, he's Chief Creative Officer of Powder Mountain, a where he's working with Reed Hastings to create a globally unique ski experience that combines art, architecture, and lots of fresh tracks.

Alex loves people and curating spaces and experiences for them: whether that means parties, music festivals, or mountain towns. He joined Summit Series out of school, throwing large scale events around the world and working on Powder Mountain, a Utah mountain resort the ownership group had acquired. He then joined one of the first social DAOs, Friends with Benefits (FWB) as Mayor/CEO, after being tapped by its founder Trevor McFedries to scale the tokenized social club beyond a Discord Server. He launched FWB Fest, an annual in-person music festival and crypto conference with past performers including James Blake, Charli XCX, and Caroline Polachek. Most recently, he joined Reed Hastings to return to Powder Mountain after the Netflix co-founder acquired a controlling stake in the resort. Alex leads brand, art, architecture, and marketing.

Blending culture, commerce, and "cool" is anything but a science, but Alex has made a career of it. I've known him for a decade and it's been a thrill to watch him continue to find strange intersections, blending worlds like music and tech, crypto and culture, and skiing and art. We talk about this, how to create spaces and events, living in the mountains, large scale art experiences, Christopher Alexander and Jane Jacobs, challenges in creating new cities, learning from Reed Hastings, and a life of deepening one's taste.

I hope you enjoy and are inspired to life a more connected, playful, and present life.

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Full episode transcript and links available at dialectic.fm/alex-zhang.

Timestamps

• (0:05): Hampton: Dialectic's First Partner
• (4:09): Commerce & Culture, Patronage, and Constraints
• (12:17): Curating People, Spaces, and Art: "Host Energy"
• (19:44): How to Throw a Party or Start a Scene
• (27:05): Unlikely Intersections and Authentic Marketing
• (35:36): Returning to Powder and Building a Unique Mountain Resort
• (42:31): Utah and Mountain Living
• (47:27): Randomness & Emergence: Christopher Alexander, Jane Jacobs, and Cities
• (52:24): Creating a Digital Feeling of Place
• (55:15): Network States and New Cities
• (1:00:42): "Community"
• (1:08:27): Organic Leadership Opportunities, Partnership, and Trust
• (1:15:12): Focused Leadership and The Power of Memetic Language
• (1:20:02): Learning from Reed Hastings as a Leader
• (1:29:09): Getting into Rooms and Finding Serendipity
• (1:32:58): Playfulness and Elon
• (1:36:25): Intuition and Career Decisions
• (1:39:10): Curating Music and a Life Goal of Refining Taste
• (1:42:56): Music's Role in Creating Great Spaces
• (1:44:08): Photography
• (1:46:02): Beginning, Learning to Ski and Scuba
• (1:48:10): Improving Los Angeles and What Makes it Special

Links

• Powder Mountain
• Friends With Benefits
• Summit Series
• How Music Works - David Byrne
• ‎Studio 54 (2018)
• Storm King Art Center
• Naoshima Island
• Marfa
• "The world is a museum of passion projects"
• Roden Crater
• Christopher Alexander
• Jane Jacobs
• The Network State
• Edge City
• Edge Esmeralda
• WSA, a Manhattan Office Tower, Becomes an Unlikely ‘It’ Building
• Remedy Place
• WAREHOUSE
• Was That a James Turrell I Just Skied By?

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