Are the Kids Alright?

This transcript was made in part by an automated service, in some cases it may contain errors. 

Ella: Welcome to Sense Space, a podcast about the built environment and all the stuff we interact with. I'm Ella Hazard.

Faraz: I'm Faraz Shah, and today I think we're gonna talk about the next generation of designers and architects across industrial design, interior design, architecture, interior architecture, all the things

Ella: All the things, all the designy things. Well, maybe like, can we step back a second and say like, I'm curious to know like why like both of us thought this like was an interesting topic, like why does this feel important? Like, let's contextualize this a little

Faraz: Yeah, I have a son that I talk about on the podcast all the time, and he is going, he just started his sophomore year of college as an industrial design student.

This is actually before they get cut down from like freshman, sophomore year. They've got a bunch of students and then they [00:01:00] narrow it down into a much smaller program.

So pre portfolio review?

Ella: I didn't know that was a thing usually that, like in architecture school, that happened naturally. Like people just were like, F this,

Faraz: There's a, there's a blend, right? Like. In the, the program that he's at, you started about maybe a hundred kids that are like, I wanna do industrial design. And then you get some folks who decide this isn't for them,

but by the end of their sophomore year, they have to put together a portfolio. They go through a review process, and it gets cut down to, I think they're 24.

you get basically 75% that either have to choose a different major. Which you've wasted. You know, all that tuition money, which actually kind of sucks.

Or you, you repeat your sophomore year of like design classes and improve your portfolio and you can, you can go through it again.

Ella: whoa, this is blowing my mind. I had no idea. That's so rigorous.

Faraz: not like this in architecture.

Ella: No, I mean, I think it's just more like self-selecting out.

Faraz: [00:02:00] Yeah.

Ella: depending on the school, I don't know if it's like the, the same amount, but I had no idea. That is insane. That's terrifying.

so you went through this whole process too

Faraz: I did, we had over a hundred students and it, we actually went down to 16 because we were limited by the number of computers in the studio.

Ella: Oh, that's adorable.

Faraz: Yeah. But

Ella: That's a small class. So then you get to know those, those kids really well. That's a pretty tight-knit group, isn't it? By the

Faraz: exactly. I think that's, uh, maybe one of the things that I really loved about Studio, and I think why, like this topic is really like personal to me is because of that connection where I still am connected back with the kids that I was in freshman, sophomore, junior, senior year of college through industrial design and now as a professional. After several decades of, of practicing

Ella: Okay. I've got a whole new perspective on that now. I also, my experience in architecture school [00:03:00] was that like I went to an engineering school, so like there wasn't much else for. Architects to do. There weren't like any other really like creative degrees or like maybe one that was burgeoning, but I probably would've been one of the kids that opted out like by year three of architecture is five year degree.

By year three, I was like, I want out, and my parents were like, no, you have to stay in near that.

Faraz: It's a, big thing and you know, I was actually doing a little bit of the, the prep for this. I, I didn't put this like as a post-it note of, of something I wanna talk about, but the financial investment, because that also feels very personal right now,

Ella: Yeah, I'm sure.

Faraz: in doing a design or architecture degree versus the like, uh, the compensation post studio.

Like

Ella: Yeah.

Faraz: that's top of mind. But

anyway, that's another episode.

Ella: whole other Oprah. Yeah.

got it. Well, I guess I was thinking about this topic from the standpoint of. Spending the last year of being kind of like a student of life and trying to figure out what I want to do when I grow up. And I was thinking about [00:04:00]how, how things were so different.

Like, for example, when I was thinking about doing trucking school, I became deeply obsessed and like went down crazy YouTube rabbit holes, like watching like trucker videos, track this, da da. And I was, it made me curious about

Faraz: Truck driving simulator.

Ella: kinda, yeah, but like it was so much more accessible. Both the good and the bad, like the horror stories, like the accidents, things like that.

But like also like what the lifestyle of like actual practicing trucker would be like. And it made me curious about like, I guess how kids would engage or decide that they wanted to be architects and like what is out there for them in like the realm of social media these days. So I did a little bit

of YouTube rabbit hole last night around

Faraz: Oh, really?

Ella: Yeah. And it was, I, I don't have anything specific to share with you other than that like my, my. Takeaways and like my algorithm will always steer me, steer me back towards like fuzzy animals and baby elephants, which is

mostly what I, and now truckers.

Um, so I, I'll admit that [00:05:00] my shorts, uh, algorithm is probably skewed a bit.

Uh, but what was interesting is like, I feel like the videos fell into kind of like three camps. First camp was. Interesting principles of like natural design, like different places around the world and like, you know, passive technologies and things like that. Like kind of explaining

things and how, how, historical buildings were built in certain vernacular.

Faraz: like using elements of nature in your design, but using like philosophies that nature uses to design.

Ella: Yep. Or like just how ancient peoples had built pre-industrial, um, and like using passive technologies to heat and cool spaces, you know, things like that. So there was like that kind of genre that was that chunk. Then there was the, we'll call it architecture porn

Faraz: Mm-hmm.

Ella: was just like beautiful, beautiful spaces.

Some of which may have, may or may not be real. Like there. I felt like there was like a bunch of [00:06:00] AI

stuff in there, which I

Faraz: And that's a whole other,

Ella: other, yeah, whole other thing, but also beautiful, still beautiful spaces, which, that's like a whole thing I don't know if that wasn't available. I remember stitching, photo, like images that I took on a digital camera together to make like a panorama.

Like Technology was not, not a thing. and then the last segment was like architecture students or young architects talking about. It's not what they thought it would be. Or you don't need to know math well, or like kind of saying what it is,

but also Yeah. So it was interesting. And while all of those things independently are kind of true, I wasn't, it didn't give me a good sense of what the profession was actually about.

Faraz: you know. Okay.

I like where this is going.

Ella: yeah. Okay. Go.

Faraz: What was it for you coming out of architecture school and going into practice? What was that difference in the expectation versus reality? Like? I think that there were some differences on the industrial design side, but I'm really curious on the architecture side.

Ella: let me couch this [00:07:00] first a bit and say that I was

never very good. Yeah. Total tempering that some of this was my own doing is that I was never, have not been very, as we might know, collectively, tech savvy, and so I was. Already slow on the uptake to like 3D model stuff. Like I didn't know any of the software very well.

Like I think we were using like MicroStation back then, or like,

I

don't, it was like, I don't know, it was like a, a, a counterpart to like AutoCAD back in the day it came outta Europe, I think. I don't know. But anyway, I was like very slow on the uptake and so. I showed up fairly unprepared to like actually be a functioning architect.

And actually some of the YouTube videos, like the Talking Heads one where people were vetting was like, what is this education and why didn't it prepare me for actual work as an architect? And like, well. I guess the other piece of it is that because it's such an intensive profession, it requires you like by, in order to be become registered to intern for a number of [00:08:00] years, which like the fastest you could do it back then was probably like three years.

So yeah, you're in school for a minimum of five years. Then you've got three years of internship after that before you can start to take your licensing exams. Um, so you come out, it's like kind of like a human baby. It's like you're birthed from college unprepared and like still needing a ton of assistance and like relatively useless to a bunch of people that then have to train you to do a bunch of stuff while they're trying to do their already difficult job that they're underpaid for.

So, I don't know, so long and short it not. I did, I didn't feel prepared at all. But What's your experience?

Faraz: whenever I went through industrial design school, I think that there was a lot of emphasis on like problem solving and research like. To the point where like, we were doing a lot of this, uh, like ethnographic research in school of like putting yourself in the mindset of a user or in the [00:09:00] mindset of someone who's gonna be affected by this thing you're gonna design.

And I think after I left school, I went into a rather large corporate entity as part of a, you know, design team. And it

was a relatively small design team, very engineering focused company. I was. Taken aback honestly by how little design work we actually did.

Ella: Yeah.

Faraz: Uh, there was so much like change management and, details and not problem solving.

And it was a, I think, a struggle at first of just how problems are framed for you or problems are presented in school.

In studio versus how they're maybe not presented to you in the workplace. And that was something that like, I know and I still do, but like have to be much more intentional about identifying the [00:10:00] problem and articulating it than like what I was ever trained to do.

Like that was something I had to learn on the job and learn

Ella: Yeah, that's fair.

Faraz: Like you weren't prepared for that, of like, Hey, guess what? You know, once you actually get out, you know, uh, I hope you had a great time having all these problems presented really cleanly for you now. But

guess what? In the future when you're actually out there working,

you've gotta figure out what the

Ella: you have to go seek problem seeking.

Faraz: Yeah.

Ella: you're like, wait a minute.

Well, yeah, exactly. You're like, oh, I, that's my job. Got it.

Faraz: Oh, shit. Yeah. Okay. Got

Ella: Yeah.

do you think now with some time and space away from school, are you.

Are you using any of the things that you learned in your education? Like I don't wanna throw shade on my education. I think this was just kind of the state of architecture education

Faraz: Mm-hmm.

Ella: general. But I think now with a lot of space, some of like the [00:11:00]ideology, the history, like things have more relevance now with, I have a, with a lot, a bunch of experience under my belt, um, than they were immediately.

What did, like, how did that, did that translate for you?

Faraz: if I had to frame it up as like. Advice for students now,

or people who are early in their career? I don't think it's the fault of the, the program. I don't think it's the fault of, you know, teaching staff. I think a lot of it had to do with us being young and just all the, the things that come with being young.

But I wish I would have been able to recognize the context or. The, the gravity of the context that they present. Like when, when a professor is assigning you to do 40 ideation thumbnail sketches, it's not because they just want you to like do a bunch of sketches and fill up the page. Right. But understanding the context that this is something that you have to [00:12:00] do in order to work through, visualize and think through, uh, a potential solution

and that the iteration is so important or that you know, you're not just going to. Uh, a history of modern architecture class as a industrial design student, just because it's part of like the liberal arts programming, but because that you will realize much later in life that all that global influence, all of those non-industrial design cues

come from somewhere else. And that dialogue of like cross practice kind of call and response is where the value comes from.

Influences from fashion, from architecture, et cetera.

Ella: that's lovely and that's, I think that's a really, that's well put and a good perspective. The question it makes me beg is. Should we take time before we go to school? Like, why are we sending, I was 17 when I went to college. That's way for something I didn't really wanna do, like why did we do this?

[00:13:00] I just paid it off last year. You know what I

Faraz: I, I applied to one school in one program. That was it. And I know that, like, gave my parents so much anxiety.

Ella: man, but it worked out like you,

you, you did

Faraz: Sure. I mean

Ella: there wasn't really a choice back then, like it's what you did, right? Like you, you went to college and for me, that was my only sort of, I felt like my only avenue out of a tiny town in Vermont. Same. Not Vermont But Indiana, but

Faraz: yeah.

Ella: yeah, I felt like my education would amount to something regardless of what it was and that like it would pay itself back. Like I had that hope. I was still hanging on to like a slice of the American dream and I guess I kind of am putting myself in the mind of kids these days. I have nieces that are college age and just the amount of like.

I don't know, societal anxiety, like I, I feel like the, the incentives to want to pressure and the incentives aren't quite there, right? Like college has gotten to be such an [00:14:00] expensive thing and it doesn't always pay itself back. And the pressure, I don't know, societal pressure is like. I could understand how the existential sort of climate dread and all of these things would make it really easy to be apathetic and say like, why bother doing this at all?

And so I guess I'm really curious about what would make a kid wanna learn something and what kids are interested in learning design and otherwise right now.

Faraz: I totally get what you're saying. at the same time, on the flip side of that, um, last year I had the opportunity to attend, a few like workshops with young architects and young interior designers. So it was like a kind of 30 under 30 type deal

in certain metro areas.

I came visit you out in LA for one

with young architects.

Uh, I've been to other ones with interior designers and I am constantly. Amazed slash inspired heartened. I don't know, whatever their adjectives there are, but [00:15:00] the positive potential for impact and change that the designers and architects that are early in their career, like fresh out,

Ella: Yep.

Faraz: um, feel and like manifest into their work.

It's, uh, it's not something. Maybe that might have been from like, lack of networking at that level when I was at that age, but I'm impressed

by how they, they, they portray themselves and portray like the, the passion that they have for this industry. So like something is drawing them in, right?

Ella: makes me happy to hear that, that, just hearing you say that bolsters my hope for this, but I feel really disconnected from designers at that age. The only way I would have to, I have a couple of friends who are professors in architecture and I have some time to talk with them in the upcoming weeks.

So maybe I'll, maybe I'll get like a little hit of that. The

hope.

Faraz: think that's actually a great call to action though. Um, I will say that whenever I came outta school, one of the things [00:16:00] that was very impactful in my life there was an older, he's gonna hate that I say this, but he was an older industrial designer, right? He'd been around for a while. but he gave such great perspective because he came from like very old school, right?

Like Canson paper and gache and white pencil, like renderings, you

know, like you, you weren't, you weren't doing this in KeyShot or three ds Max or whatever, which is also probably old know,

but,

uh, yeah, Or Inscape, right? You're not doing that. You're, you're doing it all by hand. That cross-generational bond

was so valuable, like sharing the perspective, sharing the, the advice, you know, I think is part of it, but just being able to interact with others outside of your own generation I think is super important.

And I feel like as you know, whatever age we are, we'll leave that relatively ambiguous, but like of our [00:17:00] of our age,

I think it is our responsibility to interact with. Both our elders and our peers that are, you know, earlier in their career because it's, I think there's a lot that we could learn,

not just what and wisdom we can impart, but the other way.

Ella: Yeah, I think, I think that's a really good point. What do they call it? Like reverse mentoring? I think it's just still mentoring, but like, but yeah.

Faraz: Yeah.

Ella: But yeah, I think I used to do like a lot of like guest critic critiques and things like that for like, you know, like midterm reviews, final reviews for all my professor friends.

I think I got, I don't know, I was traveling so much a couple the last couple years I got out of the circuit. But that's a good way to stay in touch with what's happening. And I don't know, there's so many good. Institutions even here locally. I think I should, that's, that's my call to action is like dip back in

Faraz: I was really thinking about this the other day of. if I were to magically, you know, uh, like Freaky Friday style, find myself as a, you know, junior, senior [00:18:00] in design school, like what would I do differently now with this mindset, I already spent an obsessive amount of time in the shop, but I feel like I would've asked. More from the faculty and learn from their experience more and just appreciated their context.

I know. I just wish I would've done that more and taken advantage of the other resources. get trained on new technologies, get trained on old technologies,

like

introduce me to all of the like woodworking equipment. Right? You don't get that opportunity without having to go way outta your way as an adult.

Ella: I think that's a good point. Yeah. And like you have all the time, well, you don't perceive it then, but then you have all

the time in the world to do that. but but you're preoccupied with, with trying to learn a whole other thing and so it's,

Faraz: Yeah. And still be young.

Ella: and still be young and do dumb things, but Well also you were like. A parent at that point, like So you were already adulting pretty hard,

Faraz: [00:19:00] yeah. Exactly.

Ella: but,

Faraz: What would you have done in architecture school now if you had Freaky Friday back in?

Ella: I wouldn't be in architecture school.

Faraz: Oh shit,

Ella: and I would've pursued, psychology, and that's what I'm back in school for now. Like, this is what I wanted to

Faraz: tell, tell me about that. Like what, what would that, what would that have like looked like?

Ella: I don't know. I mean, who's to say, but it probably would've made its way back around to something designing. And I'm not saying this 'cause I have any regret about what happened at all. Like it all is what it is. And I'm very grateful that even though I didn't like the profession the way that it was sort of laid out for me, I somehow along the way found the courage to like bust out and do it kind of my own way.

And I feel like the, the skills like. Am I the best designer in the world? No, but I am a, an excellent translator and I can listen to like a lot of different, like, disparate points of view and subject matter experts. And I'm really good at herding, like a, [00:20:00] herding all the random cats towards some sort of common mission, whether that's a new company, a startup idea, uh, a like a potluck dinner, a camping trip.

It doesn't matter. So the, the skills are there, but it wasn't obvious to me that. That, that was valuable too, I thought because I wasn't designing, you know, like the next like remco house thing that, like that I sucked at architecture and that's

Faraz: But I think you've identified something very fascinating, which is that there's not just this monolithic approach to architecture or product design or

interior design that I think maybe it's made out to be, and that like you found a lot of value in a lot of intrigue in being able to like interpret all of that information. Listen to it and distill it into something that's like important.

And I think that that is a valuable [00:21:00] aspect of architecture and design. And it's not that everybody coming out of school or entering into their career has to be like, I'm gonna be the best designer. I'm gonna be the best architect, or whatever. You need to have like your niche and your voice.

Ella: Yeah. Well, and I think I, yeah, I appreciate that. Thank you. That's generous and supportive and feels good to hear. It felt so lonely at the time because there wasn't, there weren't a lot of examples of that, and there weren't. I don't know. One of the things I would love to do at some point is go back to my alma mater and lecture on all the things you can do with an architecture degree that aren't architecture.

Faraz: Yeah.

Yeah. But it's that like how do you take that thinking, right?

Ella: Right, just for the, the one odd person that feels like they're in the wrong place but doesn't know that there's another path. And so I think that's a lot of where my personal mentorship has been focused is where like I mentored this young woman, I dunno, came to me through a colleague, friend of a [00:22:00]friend and she and I would just touch base like every month, every other month she was in at school at USC for architecture and wasn't sure.

And I was like, well take like a game theory class. Go do this, do that. And like I, she applied for grad school and I think. I think graduated from MIT with a degree in robotics

afterward. Yeah. Like so some really cool stuff that like, I don't know that I am, that's all her, but I'm so happy that she felt free and supported to go do something with her undergrad degree that wasn't directly related.

Faraz: For, for those of us who have been through this or you know, we've, we've made it through our, our careers. How do we help young designers, architects, I think, find their voice or their aesthetic. I was having [00:23:00] a conversation about this with my son actually just the other night. He's working on a, a project he was feeling a certain way, uh, like the aesthetic that he was developing looked different than what a bunch of other kids in his class were doing.

And like, trying to like, think through that with him of like, look, that's actually the valuable part of this

is that, you know, not just when you're in school, but 10, 20 years down the line. You are getting hired for your taste, your aesthetic that you've developed, and that it's not that we're employers are looking for, uh, kind of a generic, like, I need a certain level of designer. We're actually looking for someone who has a perspective and who has a voice.

How do you help people find theirs?

Ella: I don't know. For me, that process has been both like that track personally and professionally. Like I feel like I'm just now coming into my own in my. yet.[00:24:00]

Faraz: Right.

Ella: I think you've just entered this decade, maybe. Yeah. Um, so I'm just finding mine, I've always been jealous of the people who like kind of fell out knowing exactly who they were and just, you know, rocked it.

But I also would say that I wonder if there's a different way. To employ people and educate people so that you can kind of blend lived experiences with education, like becoming a student for the second time in my life right now and like actually really like I'm a ravenous for the material that I'm learning.

'cause I actually like what I'm studying, you know what I mean? I didn't, I did not know that. Like this could be fun. You know what I mean? Or that it's like challenging me to think about what I want to do next. Like I like I'm doing the right thing at the right time and this was not my exp I avoided. More education because my experience the first time was not what, like, it wasn't, I chose it, but I was too young to make that decision.

And had I had a little more life experience or kind of learned worked, learned, worked, I think my path would've looked different. but

Faraz: [00:25:00] almost impossible though. I feel like to like the idea of what we see is important. Insight and wisdom comes from the lived experience, but it's not like you can wait to have a design education or an, you know, architecture education after.

You've had the lived experience,

Ella: But

like,

Faraz: what is like

Ella: what are these, there's gotta be jobs, there's gotta be something that we could create like, I don't know, even like, like you're saying, like shop class, you know what I mean? Like are there, like where did manual labor go and like actually making things and doing things. Like I, this is getting oddly pol political, but like I think that there's some value and like part of me was like, should I, should I go back to like trade school and like learn after this trucking thing?

I was like, this is so much fun to just like. Do things with your body. Right?

Like

be engaged,

Faraz: I think opinion of one,

that this has a lot to do with the perceived [00:26:00] value of technology as a way of saving time versus the value of a slow manual.

Tedious process,

Ella: Yeah.

Faraz: Like why? Like, I mean, and I think this is a valid question, right? Like why should I go through and build this thing by hand when I can write a prompt and generate an image that maybe matches 80% of what I've got in my head?

Ella: Yeah, I think

Faraz: And I'm not saying I've got the answer to that, but

I think that's an interesting question,

Ella: I think it's opinion of two.

Faraz: question to ask oneself.

Ella: I'm gonna hop on that train and say that like, but the thing that we're somehow missing and like, don't get me wrong, I'm not a full Luddite or curmudgeon. Well, aside from the smoke signals and carrier pigeons,

Faraz: Messages and bottles.

Ella: yep. I, there's something about the process over outcome that

[00:27:00] feels important, like the trucking industry is a hundred percent gonna be taken over probably in the not so distant future by automated and it should be, but there's something about the process of being out on the open road and just like, I don't know, living it that's like beautiful. Like I, that there, I don't know.

Like we're gonna miss that part.

Faraz: Well, and I mean, even looking back now, like the catharsis of sitting in a shop,

sanding a project with a bunch of your peers, uh, at 2:00 AM right? Like you don't get that now in. At least in in the careers that I've worked in. You don't get that.

Ella: Should we make that? Should we make like a grownup shop class for like all ages?

You're like, here we go.

Faraz: I would so go,

Ella: And the classes start at midnight and go till 2:00 AM

Faraz: exactly.

Ella: very impractical. No, but I mean, commun, like there is something to be said about community, like you're saying, of learning from [00:28:00] our elders or learning from experience, but also, yeah, the gratification of

Faraz: connection. Yeah.

Ella: mm-hmm.

But also like. Making something and feeling really accomplished with like your competence or like starting, I dunno, for me in the shop it was always intimidating, like tools and things like that. And now I have all the, all the power tools in the world and each one that I buy is like scary at first. But then like I watch a bunch of YouTube videos and I figure it out.

And then once I've learned how to, like the sense of mastery that you're like, oh, I actually can do that. Like, you feel so good. Like I watch all these like TikTok videos, I watch 'em on YouTube 'cause I'm not a

Faraz: Okay, I'm gonna ask you a, a, a question,

so think about this one real quick, but. You know, you have this access to technology now, like all these resources, right? Like you can watch

a TikTok video, you can go down YouTube rabbit hole and figure out how to work this,

you know, machine or, or this technique or whatever, or like even understand a design principle.

Ella: Mm-hmm.

Faraz: Would that have changed how you were a student

Ella: Totally.

[00:29:00] This is like the carvana of like car, like it removes having to go look stupid in front of somebody and ask them and say it like at the time, like, I don't care about that now. But at the time it might've been like, it would've been hard for me to admit that I didn't know how to do something or to ask for help.

And so the YouTube ification is like, okay, I can watch five different people do this a bunch of ways and feel confident that I probably won't cut my finger off. Let's have at it versus having to go into a shop during specific hours with some dude that was sitting there and me feeling intimidated to say, I don't know how to, can you

help me?

Faraz: Can you train me on this?

Ella: Yeah. Yeah. That's a really good question. What about you? Are there things like that in your life that like, like

Faraz: I kind of wonder like it's a, a bit of a double-edged sword where, uh, on the one hand I could totally see that perspective of it empowers you to. Investigate and to be able to discover these things.

Um, on the other hand, I worry and wonder if that becomes like [00:30:00] a over-reliance on oneself versus the,

the connection community part that's really valuable of like

asking a peer,

Ella: Yes, but there's a different sense of community. What I will say though is like watching all these shorts of like women that have like torn apart, some like corner of their house and are just like going at it and like documenting this whole thing. There's a, even though I don't know those people.

personally, right? It's like a parasocial thing. I feel like. Okay, well if she can do it, I can do it. Like, and thank you.

Like we are a com community of women out here doing Yeah, totally. So like, it's, it's, it's a parasocial communal relationship, but it's not what you're talking about. And I think both are actually important.

So it's pros and cons to everything, right.

Faraz: Yeah.

Ella: I feel like you're very competent in like the shop and like with tools and things, but like is there something in your life that where, like a space where you feel kind of uncertain and that you use YouTube or some sort of.

Social tool to help you feel

more

Faraz: yeah, my, my, kids will make fun of me for this too. But, [00:31:00] um. when my kids were young, I had left my first job.

I had started my own business, so I was like a stay at home dad. And I was very fortunate that I was able to get a lot of time with my kids where I would take them to, to practice. You know, we were doing like baseball, T-ball and all that stuff. I'll be honest, I came from, uh, a household where no one was athletic, you know, south Asian dad and um. My mom wasn't that athletic and uh, both my parents were pretty old.

I had to watch YouTube to learn how to like, basically like pitch.

So like I was playing catch with my kids and I was like,

how am I,

gonna like, teach them how to like, you know, be better at like baseball or tee-ball or whatever, you know?

And I was like, shit, I actually have to like. Learn how to do this and

as an adult, go on YouTube and watch like how to throw a baseball without being like a total fucking idiot.

Ella: I love that. Like you, YouTube is my dad. Like,

Faraz: Yeah, [00:32:00] right.

Ella: but, but was teaching you how to be a good dad or like giving you the, the, the, that's awesome. That's a

Faraz: I mean, so it, you.

know, it wasn't like a a professional thing, but it was very much like a life skill

where if you didn't have exposure to that through your natural.

Environment of growing up or whatever, YouTube became a resource to like, just figure that out. And you know, even though it wasn't a professional thing, like it still ends up affecting you,

Ella: Totally. But I think I, I think that like that maybe to bring this whole sort of

thing to some sort of. It's not gonna be that poignant, but some sort of point is

is that like that, like I think it requires a certain amount of like beginner's minor stupidity or naivete to get involved in something and then there becomes a point in the process where you're like, shit, I'm way over my head.

I don't know what I'm doing. So you need a bunch of information quickly to help you get up to speed and like kind of gain your confidence back [00:33:00]before you feel like. Enough to continue that sort of iterative process to want to continue to learn again and to develop some degree of mastery in anything, right?

Like the applies

Faraz: I,

Ella: to lots of things.

Faraz: I want to, yes, and that I

think that. and I, I know we've talked about this a bunch last season, but, Self-awareness in the sense that you're open to understanding that you don't know something

and that mindset that you're talking about of being willing to go and discover it and find out.

Like you're education minded and you're self-aware enough to know that you don't know.

Ella: Yep. I think that that's like the curse of youth, or at least the way, maybe this is just like, maybe I just was like a shitty know-it-all person, but if there was one thing I wish I could have done differently is learned how to say, I don't know, and to ask for help much sooner,

like that would've made things much easier and probably more fun along the way.

But

Faraz: Maybe that's a great title for this episode of like, what would I have done differently?[00:34:00]

Ella: yeah.

Faraz: where did I go wrong? No.

Ella: Where did we go? Where did it all go? Sideways I like it.

How about this? Are the

kids all right?

Faraz: Oh, I'd like that.

Ella: Do you like that one?

Did that just murder the that.

yeah. Well, that wasn't much back and forth, was it?

Faraz: Whatever.

Ella: Yay.

Anyway, I dunno. I've enjoyed this conversation. I think we started out wanting to talk about kids these days and I realized that like, there's a lot I don't know about them, but I, I appreciate the, the fact that we're all kind of perpetual students or can be maybe should be.

Faraz: I do think it's easy as, uh, folks of a certain age to shit on the next generation.

Ella: Yeah,

Faraz: I feel like arguably it's more important, right, to like what we were talking about, right? Like, let's be self-aware here and realize

that maybe we don't have a direct understanding of what the next generation is up against and what

their context is.

But[00:35:00]

Ella: Yeah.

Faraz: let's, let's get curious and connect with that next generation of architects and designers. Let's get curious and connect with our elder generation,

Ella: Yeah.

Faraz: before they're

Ella: Yep. Yep. I think that's, those are wise words. A good place to leave it.

Faraz: Wise words from old people.

Ella: Yeah.

Faraz: Thanks everyone for listening to Sense of Space. This episode was produced by Rob Schulte with the help of associate producer Patricia Gonzalez.

Ella: Sense of Space is a Turf podcast and is brought to you by the Surround network. To hear more podcasts like this, please visit surround podcasts.com.

Faraz: Make sure to leave us a great review wherever you'd like to listen to podcasts. And please don't forget to include this in your holiday newsletter. We'll see you next time on sense of space.

Ella: Bye.