Who are Ella and Faraz?

Ella: [00:00:00] Welcome to sense of space, a podcast about the built environment and all the stuff we interact

with.

Faraz: Join us as ambassadors to Curiosity while we work together to deconstruct the built environment.

Ella: I'm Ella

hazard.

Faraz: And I'm Faraz Shah.

Ella: I'm a recovering architect and you're an ex designer. I think you're still a

designer.

Faraz: something like that. Yeah, an industrial designer by background, but I'm still a designer.

Ella: Yeah. So who are we in like, why, why should you listen to us?

Faraz: So I work for Turf and even though I'm not actually doing design at Turf right now I really do care very deeply about where and how we live and Ella you're a friend of Turf Do you want to tell us a little bit about yourself?

Ella: Sure. I am a Sort of recovering architect. I definitely care a lot about the built environment and have practiced architecture for a lot of my career. But I also have worked at the intersection of, venture design and sort of climate focused, content. and we met during my time at Armstrong World Industries.

I think we were like, somebody introduced us or set up a call to introduce us and then never showed up. And I think we just took it from there.

Faraz: I think we hit it off pretty quickly right after that supposed to be introduction and then just ended up us hanging out for for an hour and a half. But I think it is fair to say that both of us try to understand a little bit more about the the world we live in. And I think we want to help other people understand some of the nuances of the built environment.

Ella: Yeah, I think that's fair. I think the other thing that I see in common with us, or that's been a thread in our conversation has been. The idea of making design more inclusive. I think part of the reason I don't like to identify as an architect is it feels so sort of privileged and exclusive. We use all this crazy jargon and it just doesn't like, it doesn't feel accessible.

Um, and I, I think that's a big failing. And so I, I see a lot of that in you too, about trying to figure out how to make design available to everyone. And I hope that this conversation includes, um, a lot of topics that center around

that Yeah,

Faraz: deciding for people who come from different backgrounds. And honestly, it's for designing people with different levels of senses. and I'm hoping that that's something we get to talk a lot about in our upcoming episodes.

Ella: I like the messy middle of things and I, I find that our conversations often like digress, uh, from one topic to another, but the, they, neither of us are afraid to kind of stay in the mess, the messy part of it. And I, I would like to invite our listeners and our audience to kind of be in the mess with us.

Cause I think that's where all the good stuff actually

happens.

Faraz: So before we get into talking about all things Ella and Faraz and explaining maybe a little bit of our background, I want to do some show and tell.

Ella: Ooh, Um, except it's just going to be tell.

like mostly telling, right. Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell

me.

Faraz: I ended up going down a YouTube rabbit hole

and it was YouTube rabbit hole.

Ella: Yes.

Faraz: So there was a lot of nostalgia in this, but I actually ended up going and it came up in my feed. It was a studio tour with this musician, Goldie.

he was huge in the 90s, breakbeat, like jungle, drum and bass scene, which when I was a kid, I was in middle school and I think I got the first album from Goldie.

But anyway, it all came roaring back during this YouTube rabbit hole. So during the studio tour, he was talking about the process and like this technical side of making music where you know, the introduction to synthesizers and introduction to like the, the approach to sampling. And I don't know, it was just really great to, to kind of see him and hear him talk about this, but the next video came and the next video came and the next video came.

This is, this is a few hours, admittedly, that's, it's a little embarrassing,

but

Ella: time of day was this happening for

you?

Faraz: This is the middle of the day, so there's no excuse here. Uh, I'm pretty sure I'm neglecting a lot of other responsibilities,

Ella: fine.

Faraz: I ended up finding all these videos that ended up breaking down compositions of these amazing electronic artists that I listen to.

So you've got people like Apex Twin,

The Orb, Orbital,

Leftfield, The Chemical Brothers, right? I'm just name dropping all of these things that I used to love when I was in middle school, but they're still solid now. But it was great. This guy, he's on YouTube. His name's like, GuyuBeats or something is the channel.

Um, we'll have to put a link to it,

Ella: Yeah, Yeah,

Faraz: he ends up going through all of these, uh, highly recognized songs. Finds out who the sample was, how

they manipulated it. But it was all about the art of sampling and layering all these sounds on top of one another. It was really incredible because you see this really intricate arrangement [00:05:00] and like at the elemental level, like just the individual sample, but when you kind of put everything on top of each other, it just completely transforms, right? There's this tension and release this like pattern and surprise. But. What I thought was really interesting from this YouTube rabbit hole was how there were so many parallels to design.

you know, I was hearing them talk about this and you can actually see this laid out. It's this exercise in restraint. So they've got these really amazing hooks, they've got these cool samples, and it was just about as much of like the quality of what you put in as much as it was about what you left

Ella: Take out. Yeah.

Yep.

Faraz: So, and maybe more of it was actually about what you chose to leave behind. And I just thought it was so interesting that, you know, when I think about designing spaces, or I think about even some of the exercise that we do at Turf when we're creating some renderings and imagery for our products, it is so much about that.

You find these individual elements and find how you can use them in repetition, but then You're creating these moments of surprise

and you're not trying to do too much. So it's just, it was such a, a happy surprise to see some of those parallels come out while I was getting to jam out to all the favorite songs from my, my youth.

Ella: Is there any part of, like, seeing the sausage being made that demystifies it in, like, a bad

way for

you? Like,

or it got, it got better?

Faraz: it got

way better. And like I said, this is why it went on for a few hours.

Ella: I love that. I think, I really like that analogy. I guess maybe the question I have for you is about your personal design process, and how How you inform the things that you make, because we all do this differently, right? And we all, and we do it differently, like, across the span of our careers.

do you make a big mess first and then edit out? Or are

you

like,

Faraz: I think what was kind of cool about watching this process So this guy would break it down, right? But then he would also try and recreate it. So he would find the sample right and then would be like, okay Well, how do I? Try and recreate that sound what manipulation am I doing? It is kind of similar to what we do is it's all iterative,

right? So you're trying something you maybe have something in mind You you have an aesthetic in mind, or you have a, you know, a feeling you're trying to evoke in a space or in an image, and you have to iterate through it. And it's a lot of, a lot of trial, and a lot of error, and the removal is so critical.

Ella: Yeah, editing, right? What do they say, like, write drunk, edit sober? But,

yeah, exactly. I guess the other piece that I'm always curious about is like, when do you know when to walk away? Not like necessarily when something's done, but between iterations. you're handling it too much, you know what I mean?

And you're ruining it. You're like mashing it and you have to like step away from something and come back with like fresh eyes

or how

do you

gain

Faraz: I don't, know that it's ever done. Right? No matter what you, I think what any of us work on in the creative industry, I don't think anything is ever done,

or it's never perfect. But for that moment, it's what it needs to be. you can come back to anything, you know, a week later, a year later, and you have new ideas.

But I think that's just the curse of, of the creative industry is you always have something. That you can change and make better.

Ella: That's a really good share. I have a really similar, well, not similar

experience,

but I

Faraz: Were you also going down the drum and bass scene this

Ella: Kind of, actually,

yes.

Faraz: Were you really?

Ella: Kind of. What I did, I found one of my old, like, iPods, and, like, plugged it in, um, and, like, sat for hours shazamming, like, but it was also, like, probably from, like, back in the days of, like, Napster and, like, LimeWire and stuff, so it's, like, like a million track

eleven, right?

Faraz: legally

acquired, uh,

Ella: mm hmm, mm hmm, Yeah, but just, like, playing stuff and shazamming, like, all of my, like, early college, like, mixed CDs. And it was, like, a lot of drum and bass. Like, just, just, like, all kinds of ridiculousness. But it was, I don't know. It was, like, a good throwback. So, maybe we were doing this at the same time in two different places and having, like, a

nostalgia

moment.

Faraz: It's possible. I mean, even today, you know, I was, I was having lunch and I, I was, You know, thinking about like, okay, well, how am I going to talk about this YouTube rabbit hole? And then just to get myself psyched up in the mood, I'd throw on like, Goldie's first album from like 1996, which came out when I was, I think, in elementary school.

Ella: What, actually, another question for you. What format were you purchasing these things? Was it on

cassette

tape? Was it a

Faraz: No, I had CDs.

Ella: CDs.

okay.

Faraz: Yeah,

Ella: Alright, you're a young buck. I still have a bunch of stuff on cassette tape.

Faraz: So what, I mean, what were your favorite things that came out of this, this iPod? What was that experience like?

Ella: Um, I'm not all the way done with it yet. So I have saved, I'm actually going on vacation in a couple of, for a couple of weeks and I'm bringing this with me as one of my sort of Fun [00:10:00] tasks to do is to like recreate some of the old playlist. So I'll check back with you because I'm still mid process. part of me doesn't want to do, go too fast.

Cause I'm enjoying it so much. Like I want to savor it

Faraz: I'm assuming this iPod was from high school, college.

Ella: probably college.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm a little older than you aging, like fine wine, baby. yeah, I think I get where you're going with that, but like nostalgia of like, Places in time, like the things we were wearing, like where we were hanging out, like what it smelled like, Probably like a dirty warehouse somewhere. With parachute pants for the first time.

Faraz: I plead the fifth.

Ella: Yep. Okay, Jenko.

Faraz: But were there things about this experience? You know, when you were diving back into the archives of Ella's life, what did it make you think of? Because I'm assuming this might have been when you were in architecture school.

Ella: It was a hundred percent. It was a lot of like drum and bass, like techno, like house music that I was listening to up very late at night in architecture school, like trying not to cut my finger off, making a model, you know, hanging out with all the other kids. And like, we would like, you know, share the DJ responsibilities and just like blow it out in studio at 4am.

It was great. I wouldn't recommend it again, like, but it was, What about you? Like, what was it evoking for you?

Faraz: Freshness, excitement. Like, I remember kind of coming across, like, that genre of music, and it's one of those things where it was such a departure from, I think, culturally where I grew up that was not part of the, um, the social scape, right? Like it was a lot of like classic rock.

maybe some bluegrass in there, but having something like this was transformative and it just gave you a completely different perspective.

And I do think that that's something that is an important feeling for me, like going into design and just the rest of the community, right? You're always looking for something that just makes it click. Like, holy shit, this is something new. This is something different.

Ella: it's like one of many tools in the toolkit that we use as designers. Like, right? Like, what the YouTube rabbit hole or what that guy was doing in those videos is not different than it is. It's all design, right? They're just different tools. And so, what I really like is when you have experiences where, the vibe is right, because all, facets have been considered and they all work perfectly in harmony.

Like, it's been, like, very intentionally put together. And I think that, like, that's something that, in my early days, like, those early, like, late nights in architecture school, like, you're clumsy at that at first, and it takes time and observation to figure out how to make it come together well. Um, and you also have to be willing to, like, Throw some awkward dinner parties or have things that don't work on the way towards something that is really good, right?

Like, you have to be courageous enough to fail. To

Faraz: Do you think that some of the places that you were when you were in college would evoke some of the same nostalgia as your iPod? Like if you went back to campus to your studio. Heh

Ella: I have really mixed feelings about this for us, honestly. Cause like, there, like, I have fond memories of school, but it was also like a crazy hard program. And like, borderline abusive. Like, the, the, like, this is part of why I'm so frustrated with the profession. Like, your first solution isn't right, but staying up until 4am makes it better?

I'm not sure that that's true, right? Like, I'm a night owl anyway, so like, great. But like, this is part of, like, the inaccessible part of architecture and like the design education that I, I'm like pretty frustrated by. And I would like to disabuse us of the idea that like you have to suffer for something to be good.

I don't, I don't think, I think that good things come from like happy, healthy, whole people.

Um, and

Faraz: I think there's a way to, to bring joy and joy. into the process, whether it's through design education or through the act of design itself that elicits something a little bit more positive.

Ella: yeah. What was your education like when you were industrial,

right?

What's your, yep.

Faraz: So I went to school for four years at Purdue. it,

wasn't as bad. I, we always joked around that like all the designers were the fun people that you wanted to hang out and architecture people were more serious,

Ella: so annoying and self referential.

Faraz: right? So I felt like the design experience in college was actually, I mean, there were a lot of late nights, but it was something about building, working with your hands, being constructive and iterative. And it was, it was very much a, like a craft to it that I appreciated.

I think there's a really interesting thing. point in my career where, you know, you come out of school, you're working for your first job and you kind of get a sense of where you fit and maybe where you don't fit. And I think in the industrial design community, and this is [00:15:00] probably true for, for other facets of design, but there are parts of this world that are very stylistically driven. And then there's other parts of it that are a little bit more function based. And I found myself, being drawn to how things work, not necessarily what they looked like.

I mean, I'll be honest, I wasn't the greatest sketcher, right, or the greatest marker renderer, but I could get the job done and, you know, communicate the idea with like a really loose sketch. But where I really, really had a great time was trying to like 3D model something and solve that problem and make the prototype and make it functional.

And I think that informed. a lot of the rest of my career. So I started out in design. I had a few other, you know, um, side, side quests, and then found my way into pretending to be an engineer for almost 10 years across a couple of different companies.

Ella: What does that mean?

Faraz: yeah, so I, I had my, you know, industrial design degree, but I was working with, um, our engineering team.

So I was included, and I think this is a really interesting part of, uh, My career trajectory is that I worked with engineers who were very open. So they would actually invite me to, okay, here's how you would actually 3d model these features. Here's how you would integrate, um, these elements for manufacturing.

And we got really, really detailed to the point where that was actually part of my job now. when I started my career, it was in the like interiors, contract, furniture industry. So a lot of office furniture on the kind of commercial scale. So I get a chance to do like die cast parts. I get an opportunity to create, um, like with the wood structure that goes into lounge furniture. And as I get into this process, I get a chance to dabble in other kind of tangentially related areas. So like on the lounge side, I'm doing. The foam, I'm doing the upholstery. I'm actually learning how to sew and how to do this with manufacturing in mind, right? It's not just about making the thing, but it's making it in context of someone actually has to put this thing together, put it in a box and get it to a client.

And then that client has to sit in it and they've got to be comfortable. when you start thinking about the impact of your design choices, or your engineering choices, that it actually ends up having a really significant impact on the people using it. And that means, you know, that's true for the operator in a factory, and it's also true for the person who's, um, you know, on the consumer side.

And, and I think that informed a lot of, a lot of my career.

Ella: sounds to me like an early stage. You took a lot of sort of responsibility and accountability for the intentional decisions that were to be made. And was that something that you were sort of seeking out or that like just kind of place and time working with those engineers?

They wanted to sort of show you

Faraz: I mean, I think it was one of those things where you're just drawn to it, right? You know, that was where I found myself fitting in. you know, I think I've mentioned before, like, I absolutely love factory tours. I love being in a factory. I love working in a factory. When you start to have these, these kind of draws to like these areas, like, I don't know, you get sucked into everything else that comes along with it.

So when I was in a different part of my career, you know, I started getting into maybe some of the more creative aspects again, where you're creating video and film content. And now, you know, I'm, I'm over on the dark side into marketing, but it's all informed by that same process that you went through early in the career, which is, What you do and the choices you make connect with someone at a human

level.

And I think that was something that was important because I, I think that's the connective tissue or the, like the common thread through all of these things.

Ella: I don't think marketing has to be the dark

side and

I think the way that

you and the the, the turf, the turf team do it is actually quite sensitive and thoughtful. Um, so if, even if it is dark in other places than here, um, but yeah, I think you're right. Like it's, it's, it's humanness and like, I don't know, maybe this is silly to like personify things, but like companies or businesses are just.

Assemblages of people, right? And they make things [00:20:00] that are made by usually people to some degree, and they go to be used by people. Like it all just comes down to people. So I like the idea of like that connective

tissue

Faraz: Yeah. I think I'm, I'm really fortunate that I get to work with really talented people to help do those things. But you know, at Turf, we do a lot of these, um, like we create a lot of architectural acoustic products, but what it really ends up meaning is that we help kind of create and define what a space looks and feels like. And I think knowing that there's that impact on somebody, like emotional or physical impact on, on someone and how they, they feel in a space is what, what drives a lot of what we do. And it's that, that empathy, but also, you know, you're trying to create something powerful.

Ella: Yep. Like it needs to be functional. It needs to be beautiful and it needs to create a sense of of vibe

Faraz: Yes.

Ella: that's approachable, and I think you guys kind of thread that needle pretty, pretty

Well,

Faraz: Well, that's a lot about me. Um, why don't you tell me about yourself, Ella? Where do you come from?

Ella: the wilderness of Vermont, by way of architecture school, uh, in upstate New York. I don't think I ever really wanted to be an architect, but I didn't know what else to do, and everybody's like, oh yeah, you'd be good at that, and so I kind of just like, Forrest gumped my way through a bunch of things.

And somehow I guess it kind of stuck. Um, but yeah, I, I, I graduated with a professional architecture degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and swiftly took that degree out to the west coast because in California you could do your internship hours at the same time that you could take your

tests.

Um, so it was sort of the fastest route to getting licensed. And rather than to go get another degree and take on more debt, I decided that licensure was sort of the path. And I was also back on the, uh, the achievement bandwagon back then. So I needed a, a good, a good goal to shoot for. Um, but I'm really glad that I did it.

I, I realized that, uh, recently that there are fewer than, it's like less than half of a percent of registered architects nationally are women of, uh, color or black, black women.

Um, and so That's an incredibly small percentage.

I think it's like under 500 in the U. S. And so for me, even though I'm not practicing, I maintain that and I, I have kind of worked my way Through architecture, spent a lot of time trying really hard to love architecture and the practice of it in its kind of current form and just couldn't get behind it, I think in part because I couldn't see myself there and I didn't see any sort of direct paths toward, success agency control.

I worked in large firms. I worked in small firms. I opened my own firm, did a whole bunch of things. And. I think the side dalliances that started to pop up in the way, in the form of like different startups or things, making things that would go into architecture or into the built environment. Um, those were the experiences that I got really excited about.

And I think it became a bit of a startup junkie for a while.

Faraz: I've had some of those experiences.

Ella: yeah, I'm curious to like crawl down some of our, our rabbit holes

Faraz: That might be a whole separate

Ella: Oh, just on that. I am really curious what drew you to architecture? Cause I know you mentioned earlier, you know, some of the architecture school was, was challenging and frustrating, but what, what drew you in at the beginning?

Honestly, I don't know. My dad slapped this like gigantic phone book sized thing of like careers and he was like, pick, pick something. And I was like, I

don't know.

I was in eighth

Faraz: It's at the first page. A, architecture.

Ella: I was like, architecture and marine biology. But as it turns out, I'm not really great in the ocean and like where you can't see underneath you.

So that was out. So that's, here we are. But I think what I realized is that I like, I like the act of creating and I like the messy front end of business, of making things. And I also think that the built environment is such an awesome playground that realizing the architects and people who have the privilege to design buildings and cities and spaces, like it's a small select group of like very few people that design things for, for lots of people to experience.

Like that's a big responsibility.

And so I think. I don't know. I think I'm still on my path to sort of finding, um, different adventures within and around the built environment. I really like venture design. I really like climate related stuff. I really like

materials.

Um, but I think all of that is to say that it took me a long time to come back around to being able to say, I think I am actually an architect and I'm proud to be that, and I think it can mean something different than what I thought it was and what I saw when I was kind

of coming

1. [00:25:00] Yeah.

Faraz: maybe some of those frustrations with the education process or the industry not to throw shade on the industry but more as there is a lot of responsibility like you said. So, how do you channel it for good, right? It sounds like that's some of your motivation here is.

Ella: Yeah, definitely born out of frustration and not specifically my education. It just was like the state of practice and the industry at the time. I think our, our business model, honestly, architects, like our value proposition needs to shift. and so I'm kind of curious about how to influence, That and how we might think about giving architects more agency and ownership and kind of participation in the upside and change, how we navigate,

navigate, but

Faraz: What are you hopeful for for architects in the future?

Ella: I want architects to have more flexibility and freedom to do the stuff that they're good at, because we've figured out a way to solve the sort of contractual administrative.

Faraz: Get the paperwork down.

Ella: yeah, but it's just so much risk involved, right? It's like, it's such a litigious profession. So I would love to see architects liberated to do what they can do very well.

Because they think in a really unique way that's not like, like other people. And I think all designers do.

But I, I would like to see more of

that.

Faraz: I mean, you know, I was only joking earlier when I said that the architects were super serious people you might not want to hang out with, but they do think very differently in a systems way that I think is so unique.

Ella: yeah, they can hurt a lot of cats and orchestrate a lot. Like they're generalists and they have to be right, but also incredibly detail oriented about certain things. But you're also kind of right. They are the boring people that talk to you at the party. Cause they find each other and all they talk about is architecture.

I've been guilty of this myself.

Faraz: I think designers do the same thing.

Ella: Yes. But I think that's been the joy is like, like realizing that design is a language and that there's common language across all of it.

Faraz: So, I mean, you know, you mentioned a little bit of interest in the materials side and supply chain. What are some of those areas that you're interested in tackling? You know, you think about the responsibility that architects have in creating this built environment. How does that connect?

Ella: I've spent a lot of the last couple of years thinking about, um, and working on circularity and understanding where buildings go to when they die.

Um, which turns out is just a landfill.

Faraz: And maybe we'll find out. Do buildings go to heaven because maybe they have a soul?

Ella: Some of, some of them do. Buildings definitely have souls. So, thinking a lot about, um, you talked about intention and the decisions that we make. Um, I think that materials and our supply chain and how we, how we obtain the things that we use to build with can, should, and will change. And I am really excited to be a part of that.

I have a show and tell though.

Faraz: tell me about your show and tell.

Ella: I was gifted this cool little deck of cards that says, It has untranslatable words on it, um, and it's

Faraz: What does that mean? It is untranslatable.

Ella: So it's like words that come from different languages that don't have direct translations to English. And I was thinking, like,

there's so

many of them. So I

Faraz: I'm really curious how you're going to translate that into English because that is all I've got.

Ella: no, okay, so I picked one to start with here because I like it. I think it kind of describes. How this podcast process and this team has felt to me thus far. But I'll give you an example on what I think I'm going to try to do with these. To see if I can find one that aligns with whatever sort of content or subject matter we have for an episode. If I can make it work. But I, here's our kickoff one. I'll just read to you like what's on the card itself. The word is, I believe I'm pronouncing this, well, People will correct me if it's wrong. Eudaimonia. It's from ancient

Greek.

And, it says, Often translated as happiness, it really means the deepest kind of fulfillment, often comprising of flourishing work and love life.

It's accepted that eudaimonia can go hand in hand with lots of day to day frustration and pain. You could be correctly described as possessing eudaemonia, even though you have periodically are really rather grumpy. Very strange description. But what I liked about this and why this is my show and tell is that I, I like that there are things that don't directly translate, um, and sometimes like take a lot of describing, I was thinking a lot about like people's like elevator pitch or the way that they talk about themselves.

Um, and like, we're so focused on trying to like. Make it succinct, um, and like clear and direct. And I think that I keep harping on this idea of like messiness or like maybe using too many words or like getting it, getting it all on there before you edit back. And I am kind of hoping that like this podcast can be a little bit of [00:30:00] getting it all on there and kind of being messy together.

But that when you kind of look at it at the end, like we're editing back to something that's meaningful. And I think that. It's, it's kind of like these, these cards, right? Like you're, you're, you're not able to directly translate, like,

what it

means.

Faraz: There is a thing to be said about being lost in translation. And,

you know, even in design school, right? Half the stuff was, what can I misinterpret? And maybe that's even not the right word of misinterpreting. It's not a bad thing. Reinterpreting. So hopefully somebody reinterprets everything that we have to say into something

Ella: Yeah, I like that idea. But, this one reminds me to, to stay in the mess. That's my show and tell, and I'm not gonna go through all of them today, but I've got a select

few.

If,

Faraz: is eudaimonious. Is that an appropriate use of

that word? Is that real? Did I just make that up?

Ella: I, I hope you made it up, but it does sound right. I'll co sign, even if it's wrong, I'm in it with you.

Faraz: That's perfect.

Ella: But I just like that it also includes space for grumpiness. I think that's healthy.

Faraz: Yeah, just a little bit.

Ella: Just a little bit. Yeah.

Faraz: Well, thanks so much for giving us that show and tell. I'm really glad you brought us full circle. Normally, in other episodes, we'll be actually having other segments here in this section. So maybe we'll be talking to experts. Maybe we'll be phoning a friend. Maybe we'll read a letter that someone brought on Carrier Pigeon to us.

Ella: Carrier pigeon. Okay. Okay. All right.

Faraz: But we are very excited to hear from all of our listeners to to be able to, to get a sense of how they feel about this. Because I think, um, through the cash, I can't even make up another word. I was going to try and do eudaimony.

Ella: Eudem Miferous?

Faraz: I don't

know. We do hope though that our listeners get a chance to reinterpret what they hear.

And you know, we're really excited to hear what they have to say about what architecture means to them, what design means to them. And I think, like the title, Sense of Space, what does that mean to you? Because this means a lot of different things to a lot of different people.

Ella: Yep. I agree. I think also, you know, our conversation is, you know, extended across a couple of years now and we never run out of things to say, but I also recognize that, I'm not sure I understand what's important, sort of, the next generation coming and what people care about with their space.

I mean, there was this whole, like, pandemic craze of, like, you know, TikTok, like, redoing furniture, like, like, people have, like, taken an interest in their space, and it's become part of content, but it's also, I don't know, like, it was kind of awesome to see, and I'm really curious, what is working really well that we want to celebrate that, like, feels good?

what doesn't feel good? Like, what, which spaces feel like they're not accessible to everybody? And how can we help that? I want this to be, like, a platform where we can kind of talk about what's important to everybody and not just what we

think.

Faraz: Yeah. I think, yeah, this will become think it's safe space for us to share and maybe asking some of the big questions.

Ella: Mm hmm.

I don't know that we have to answer them.

I'm not, I'm not sure if we're qualified to, but I think just asking them is, that could be a

good

goal, you

Faraz: Yeah, I do think that you're, I think you're absolutely right. And you, you nailed it. That just asking the question is where we all just need to start.

And with that, that's maybe how we'll end.

Ella: Okay, bye. Come

Faraz: Well, thank you so much for listening to Sense of Space. This episode was produced by Rob Schulte with help from associate producers Moti Tavassoli and Patricia Gonzalez. And we all collectively have been really excited to research all this content. And we really look forward to all of our next episodes.

Ella: Sense of space is a turf podcast and is brought to you by the surround network by Sandow design group. To hear more podcasts like this, please visit surroundpodcast. com.

That's podcasts with an S.