How do you build a design career that spans continents, cultures and scale, and then redesign your life after a wake-up call? Rido Pin is a Director at Plus Studio, a solutions company for the built environment, with 11 studios across Australia and New Zealand and projects worldwide. Originally from the Netherlands, Rido’s journey has taken him from cycling the fields of Holland, to island life in Curaçao, to New York skyscrapers, and finally to Sydney, where he now helps lead Plus Studio’s rapid growth. This conversation comes at a milestone moment: last week, Frost* unveiled Plus Studio’s new brand refresh, reflecting its collaborative culture and future vision. Listen in as Vince and Rido talk about the launch of the new brand identity and what it means for Plus Studio, his career, and how resilience and well-being have shaped his leadership and outlook on life. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Designing creative independence with Ajaz Ahmed
What happens when you combine a love of design with a mind for business? For Ajaz Ahmed, it meant building one of the world’s most successful creative companies from scratch before starting all over again. Ajaz is the visionary founder of AKQA, the global digital agency that he grew to 5,000 staff across 30 countries. After three decades at the helm, he stepped down and launched Studio One, an agile new venture built for the AI age, where creativity is unleashed and hierarchy stripped back. Born in the Thames Valley and inspired by architecture from an early age, Ajaz began working at a software company as a teenager, driven by obsession with design and a fascination with business. His story is one of ambition, humility and reinvention. Listen in as Vince and Ajaz unpack the role of AI in creativity, the myth of scaling and mediocrity, and why having taste still matters more than ever. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Designing human connection through art with Paul Cocksedge
Growing up in North London in the 80s, no one was talking about art or design. Life was about conversations with neighbours on the street, the good and the not so good. Four decades later, Paul Cocksedge’s work is grounded in these formative years. Known for his unorthodox approach to materials in works that span public art, sculpture and architectural installation, everything he designs is about human connection. Paul founded his eponymous studio with Joana Pinho in 2004, they met at the Royal College of Art in London. The studio’s work is underpinned by its extensive research into the possibilities of technology, materials and making processes. They’ve collaborated with the V&A in London to Friedman Benda in New York, plus luxury brands including Hermès, Swarovski and BMW and work by the studio is held in numerous important collections worldwide. Listen in as Vince and Paul discuss how to be human in the era of AI, stretching ideas at the Royal Academy of Arts with Ron Arad and why working in the public realm matters to him. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Designing modern craftsmanship with Elad Yifrach
When Elad Yifrach was growing up his art teacher mother would entertain he and his sisters by setting up art projects on their dining room table. It wasn’t long before his bedroom was home to stacks of magazines covered in sticky notes, and he was studying a unique architecture and interior design course at Technion, “kind of like the MIT of Israel”. Yifrach is the Founder and Creative Director of L’OBJET, where he’s been bringing collections of the highest quality artistic objects to life for 20 years. His work exceeds traditional craftsmanship. Through effort, imagination and genuine collaborations with exceptionally skilled and open-minded craftspeople his collections transcend. A telltale sign of what was to come, his first prototypes were picked up by Bergdorf Goodman. Listen in as Vince and Elad discuss studying at the same design school as Lanvin’s Alber Elbaz, working with the Haas Brothers on making monsters, and the unbridled joy of bringing someone new into your creative practice.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Designing sustainable architecture with Keith Hempel
Keith Hempel always knew he was going to be an architect. Growing up in Southern California with a creative mother and a technical father, he seemed destined for the vocation. A transformative, “eye opening” and “earth shattering” year studying the craft in Florence set him on his way. Today, he helps lead a cohort of over 500 architects, engineers, landscape architects, interior designers and planners in his role as President/Chief Design Officer at LPA Design Studios. The integrated firm delivers timeless, sustainable built environments with a collaborative approach and focus on research-driven sustainable solutions. Listen in wherever you get your podcasts as Vince and Keith discuss how his Grandmother helped build the Apollo spacecrafts, the strengths and limitations of creative intuition and why it takes years to truly become a leader. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Your life is the biggest design project you will ever undertake!
In his Design Your Life podcast series, Vince Frost discusses how design principles can be applied to everyday life with a group of leading creative guests.
Listen in as designers, journalists, CEOs and founders reveal the key turning points in their lives and talk about the role design has played in shaping the success of their brands and careers. designyourlife.com.au
Vince Frost is the CEO and Executive Creative Director of Frost*collective, a strategic creative group dedicated to designing a better world through human-centered design. Its goal is to design experiences that enrich lives by combining specialist skills to tackle complex challenges and drive superior results.
Listen to Design Your Life with Vince Frost, Table Manners with Jessie and Lennie Ware and many other podcasts from around the world with the radio.net app
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