Scratching the Surface

Christoph Lindner is the President and Vice-Chancellor of the Royal College of Art. An interdisciplinary scholar of cities and visual culture, he’s authored or edited over fifteen books across art, architecture, media, cultural studies, and urban geography. Prior to this role at the RCA, he served as Dean of the Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment at University College London and Dean of the College of Design at University of Oregon. In this conversation, Jarrett and Christoph talk about the changing nature of art and design education, the role of higher education in this current moment, and why the RCA blends artistic practice with scholarly research. Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/254-christoph-lindner.
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We're taking the summer off and will be republishing some of our favorite episodes from the archives through August. This episode originally aired April 13, 2022. — Robert A.M. Stern is an architect, teacher, and writer. He is the founder of Robert A.M. Stern Architects, served as dean of the Yale School of Architecture from 1998 to 2016, hosted the PBS series Pride of Place in 1986, and served on the board of directors for the Walt Disney Corporation from 1992 to 2003. He’s the author, most recently, of Between Memory and Invention: My Life in Architecture. In this conversation, Mr. Stern talks about his early interest in architecture history and the possibilities of an alternate career as a historian or curator, how leading Yale changed how he thought about architecture, and why the architecture discourse isn’t as interesting to him anymore. (Oh, and we also talk about martinis!) — Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/212-robert-a-m-stern. 
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We're taking the summer off and will be republishing some of our favorite episodes from the archives through August. This episode originally aired October 13, 2021. — Esther Choi is a multidisciplinary artist and architectural historian. In 2019, she published Le Corbuffet, a Fluxus-inspired artist's book that adopts the form of a cookbook and in 2020, she started Office Hours, a socially-engaged initiative that cultivates the sharing of knowledge among practitioners who identify as Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. In this episode, Esther and Jarrett talk about working between photography and architectural theory, genres of writing, and building a body of work that’s hard to define. — Links from this episode can be found at https://scratchingthesurface.fm/199-esther-choi. 
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We're taking the summer off and will be republishing some of our favorite episodes from the archives through August. This episode originally aired March 16, 2022. — Chris Rudd is a designer, community organizer, and youth worker. He’s currently a professor of community-driven design at IIT Institute of Design and founder of ChiByDesign, a black-owned and people-of-color led human-centered design firm. In this conversation, Jarrett and Chris talk about the intersection of community organizing and design, the limits of co-design, and what anti-racist and post-capitalist design looks like in practice. — Since this conversation, Chris left his position at IIT and is focusing on building ChiByDesign. Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/210-chris-rudd. 
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We're taking the summer off and will be republishing some of our favorite episodes from the archives through August. This episode originally aired October 28, 2020. — Alicia Cheng is a founding partner of the New York design studio MGMT and the author of the book This Is What Democracy Looked Like: A Visual History of the Printed Ballot. She previously worked as a designer for Method, was a co-design director at the Cooper Hewitt, and is currently an external critic for the MFA program at RISD. In this episode, Jarrett and Alicia talk about how the design of ballots can teach us about the United States’s uneasy relationship with voting, mixing design history with American history, and how research feeds her design practice. Alicia is currently the design director at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. — Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/165-alicia-cheng. 
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James Bridle, a writer and technologist, dives into thought-provoking discussions about artificial intelligence and human-centered design. They critique conventional definitions of intelligence, arguing for a more inclusive understanding that embraces non-human perspectives. Bridle also explores the potential pitfalls of design focusing on corporate rather than genuine user needs. Additionally, he shares insights on a modular approach to construction and the role of speculative fiction in sparking creativity. The conversation is an intriguing blend of art, technology, and ecology.

We're taking the summer off and will be republishing some of our favorite episodes from the archives through August. This episode originally aired December 22, 2021. — Lorraine Wild is a designer who teaches and writes. A graduate of Cranbrook Academy of Art and Yale School of Art, Lorraine runs Green Dragon Office in Los Angeles and is on the faculty of the graphic design program at California Institute of Arts. She’s written extensively about graphic design for a variety of publications. In this wide-ranging conversation, Jarrett and Lorraine talk about the early years at Cranbrook, working for the Vignellis, rethinking design history, and what it means to be a graphic designer today. — Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/204-lorraine-wild. 
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Kyle Chayka, a writer on art and technology, discusses his insights on minimalism and its cultural implications. He explores how minimalism has been reshaped by the pandemic, unraveling its association with high culture and deeper complexities. The conversation also dives into the role of aesthetics in design, the evolution of writing about design, and how cultural narratives influence our understanding of taste. Chayka emphasizes the interplay of technology and capitalism in shaping cultural perceptions while championing critical engagement with cultural consumption.

Leonard Koren is a writer, aesthetics expert, artist, and publisher. He’s the author of books like Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers, What Artists Do, Arranging Things: A Rhetoric of Object Placement, Musings of a Curious Aesthete, and most recently On Creating Things Aesthetic. From 1976 to 1981, he was the editor and publisher of Wet: The Magazine of Gourmet Bathing. In this conversation, Jarrett and Leonard talk about methodologies and conceptual tools, bookmaking, avant garde graphic design, and the influence of Leonard’s architecture education on his career. Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/253-leonard-koren. 
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Ingrid Schroder is the director of the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London. She was previously Head of Design Teaching and Director of the MPhil in Architecture and Urban Design at the University of Cambridge Department of Architecture. In this conversation, Jarrett and Ingrid talk about the legacy and future of the AA, the changing states of architecture and design education, and what experimental design education looks like today. Links from this episode can be found at scratchingthesurface.fm/252-ingrid-schroder. 
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