Design the Future

Julie Ju-Youn Kim, FAIA, is the William H. Harrison Professor and Chair of the School of Architecture at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she founded and directs the Flourishing Communities Collaborative, an interdisciplinary research and design lab. She is also founder and partner of C2 Architecture Studio.In her early-career years in Detroit, Julie tried to meet as many people as possible and found that opportunities -- for practice and teaching -- presented themselves. Julie’s current graduate studio, which is also a Flourishing Communities Collaborative effort, is related to her vision for the school -- melding practice, research, education, and technology into a common conversation rooted in relationships.  Navigating the moment from where she sits, Julie says that she “thinks about the capacity of architects and designers as agents of change for the better and stays focused on the students and their futures as empathetic, compassionate leaders for the future. They ground me!” In addition to her teaching and practice work, Julie is working on a new book (anticipated from Routledge in 2027): Intervening in the Urban Palimpsest: Design, Equity, and Community Agency. “This exploration is about understanding cities as dynamic palimpsests: they are shaped by meaning, memory, history, and by transformation,” she says. “This is our context.”

Gladys Ly-Au Young is a founding partner of the Seattle firm, Side x Side Architects. The firm is changing practice by broadening the spectrum of architectural services, to promote community focused design that supports equity and sustainability in the built environment. Gladys was honored this year with the Hero Award from Living Future, which recognizes people who are advancing progress toward a living future for all. Gladys described what it’s like to work at the intersection of architecture, sustainability, and social justice. “It is important for build a community of care,” she says. “We have to focus on transformational changes. And I think we have to shift our thinking from ‘what is the impact?’ to ‘who is impacted the most?’” She talked about agency: “Building resiliency for me has everything to do with finding belonging and a sense of connection. That helps me make the changes I need to see.” She is also thinking a lot about regeneration, which she says “depends on our collective capacity to improve the ecosystem for a thriving future for all. All means everyone and everything.” 

Barbra is the founder and CEO of BuildingEase and Sustainable Performance Institute -- an industry leader whose innovative vision drives market transformation from public policy to professional practice. Her work focuses on the intersection of systems, processes and culture. With a diverse background of fine arts, social psychology and nearly 30 years in architecture and sustainability consulting, she brings a perspective that engages the human dynamics of decision-making and creative collaboration to technical work. Barbra has always been most interested in the how. Her advice for those who want to be effective working on sustainability in the built environment is to “develop enabling skills.” Because, she says, “Technical knowledge is necessary but insufficient. Any work in sustainability requires systems thinking, understanding of change dynamics and change management, communication, facilitation skills, and negotiation skills.”

Erica McBride is the Regenerative Operations Manager at Architectural Nexus -- known as Arch Nexus. She oversees the performance and integrity of the firm’s two certified Living Buildings, in Sacramento and Salt Lake City. Erica was honored with the Living Future Hero Award in 2025 and holds credentials as a WELL AP, LEED Green Associate, and Living Future Accredited professional. Her work reflects a deep passion for regenerative design and sustainable building operations.Erica is living these buildings -- experiencing and nurturing them in a hands-on way. She shared some great stories with us about what that means (including days that require a squeegee on the roof in the rain or even a swim in a cistern!). She has inspiring advice about how the living building challenge is, as she puts it “so attainable! You really just have to, to think about the building as an ecosystem. Then ask: ‘How do all of these pieces within the building ecosystem fit together?’ Once you understand how your building likes to be operated, it’s easy.”She also has thoughts about what could make it even better: She’d love to see the operations people at the table at the outset of the project design and planning. She believes that operations people have a lot of practical experience that could be leveraged as design decisions are made.

Jenn Taranto has more than 25 years of experience in commercial real estate and construction and serves as Vice President of Sustainability at STO Building Group, a major construction organization. Passionate about reducing environmental impact, she drives STOBG’s internal sustainability strategy, helps clients define CSR goals, guides project teams to achieve milestones, and supports efforts to lower costs and emissions. We talked with Jenn about her long-term role with Built Environment Plus, the New England-based regional green building nonprofit, and how such groups are supporting market and industry transformation. Jenn suggests that people working on sustainability in the construction sector should be “deeply curious, have loads of tenacity, and be interested in breaking systems to build better ones.” She was instrumental in getting the Contractors’ Commitment off the ground and shared its reason for being. “We saw a real need for a system to encourage companies to track progress and engage in this transformation, she says. As for how we’re progressing -- the movement, the industry, and society overall -- we asked Jenn if we’re where she thought we’d be by now. “Not exactly,” she said. “Where’s my hoverboard?”

Stacy Glass, co-founder of ChemFORWARD, passionately tackles the issue of toxic chemical exposure. She emphasizes the need for a world where all chemicals are vetted and hazardous ones eliminated. The conversation dives into the significance of consumer advocacy and smarter product choices to avoid ‘regrettable alternatives.’ Stacy discusses innovative collaborations among industries to enhance chemical safety, aiming for measurable progress. She urges future leaders, especially millennials and Gen Z, to take on the mission of transforming our chemical landscape.

Kaarin Knudson is an architect, a writer, and an educator with more than 25 years’ experience in design, sustainability, and community building. Trained as a journalist before becoming an architect, her work has always focused on people and place. In 2017, after a decade in architectural practice, she organized the public-interest project Better Housing Together to address Lane County’s housing crisis. This work supported the creation of Eugene’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund, Lane County’s first Affordable Housing Action Plan, and Oregon’s landmark middle housing reforms. In 2024, she was elected as Mayor of Eugene, Oregon, with 73% of the primary vote and 96% in the general election. Kaarin teaches planning and urban design at the University of Oregon, and she speaks at regional and national conferences about sustainable cities, housing, and the work of guiding community change. She is co-author, with Nico Larco, of The Sustainable Urban Design Handbook (2024).We discussed what this moment is calling us all to do. “I think we are building new muscles and new relationships and new patterns of behavior with one another,” she said. “This is challenging us to think about how to work in different ways and how to stay focused on the future that we want to build. The framing of the problem is going to determine the solutions. We have to be the people who are framing the problem in a way that allows the solutions to be more connected, more productive, more about advancing into this future together.” 

Kayleigh Houde, Associate Principal and Global Computational Projects Lead at Buro Happold, shares her expertise on computational engineering and its impact on climate progress. She discusses the significance of embodied carbon in MEP systems and introduces a pivotal guide for practitioners. Kayleigh emphasizes the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration, stating that computation is a tool for enhancing human connectivity in climate initiatives. She also touches on the role of AI in addressing carbon emissions, reinforcing the need for responsible technology in sustainable practices.

As the Head of Sustainability for Henning Larsen, Kritika Kharbanda spearheads the global sustainability team’s initiatives, goals, and growth. She serves on the ULI New York’s Climate and Sustainability Council and is the co-chair for AIA New York’s Building Science Committee. We talked about her journey from India to Japan, Denmark, and the U.S. We discussed storytelling and negotiations; evidence-based design; and her role with Pathways AI,a climate-tech startup using AI to automate Environmental Product Declarations; and her Substack. We also asked her about whether she feels like she’s a part of an industry or a movement (a question that feels more important now than it has since we began asking it in our first episodes in early 2020). “If I were just part of an industry,” she says, “I’d probably be doing my nine to six, designing buildings, and calling it a day. But in my head and heart, I feel called to join with others in learning and collaboration and advocacy. We are building relationships and working together toward tangible outcomes. This is a movement. I am part of it, and I think everyone should be a part of it, because just being part of the industry is not enough anymore.” 

As VP of Building Resilient Futures at Enterprise Community Partners, Krista Egger stewards the nonprofit’s national environmental programs, including Green Communities, Health Action Plan, Resilience Academies, and Decarbonization Hubs. Krista went to Oberlin and and studied physics and architectural history. After college, a stint with AmeriCorps introduced her to a kind of applied building science. “I had the opportunity to identify root causes and then make things better,” she says.  Sometimes making things better means dismantling long-held beliefs. “For too long,” she says, “there has been a perceived predicament of whether people can build affordable housing or green housing, whether there can be a standard way to operate buildings or green ways of operating buildings. Those are false choices.”The programs that Egger leads are leveraging capital and policy and resources to solve for barriers that prevent all housing from being affordable, healthy, and resilient. “We are centering the needs of people who live in housing to make decisions about housing.”related links:Health Action Plan framework Green Communities Criteria