Growing up in public housing on Roosevelt Island in the middle of New York City’s East River, Elie Gamburg went to sleep every night staring at the city’s remarkable skyline from his bedroom window. His father was an artist and his mother a mathematician, so, “I guess I sort of had to do architecture if nothing else.” 

Gamburg is a Design Principal at KPF, a global architecture firm known for designing some of the most innovative and high-profile buildings around the world. Working from New York and London, with a lot of travel around the world in between, Elie has been innovating for cities for over 20 years. His work is consistently sensitive to human scale, urban context, and sustainability. Some of the more famous projects he has worked on at KPF are the Seaport Square Master Plan and Channelside in Boston, Atlantis The Royal in Dubai and NYU Shanghai. 

As a kid, everything was about buildings. Drawing them, looking at them, reading about them. After high school, he spent a summer at Cornell University, to see if he was cut out for his life’s ambition. Unsurprisingly, he was. Much of his time is still spent at school; he’s taught studios at his alma maters, Cornell and Harvard. He was an adjunct professor at NYIT for eight years and has served as a guest critic at Yale to name a few. 

Listen in as Vince and Elie discuss how 100 years ago New York was the Dubai of the times, the concept of Central Social Districts, and why he has Ganesha, the god of wisdom, mischief and fun on his desk. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As an architect, are you influenced by the environment you grew up in, even if your work looks vastly different to where you spent your formative years? John Pawson thinks so. He grew up in the north of England in the 1950s with his four sisters, playing with kids from houses around their family home. Despite being a master of minimalism, he grew up in a house that was quite the opposite.

John Pawson CBE has spent over forty years making rigorously simple architecture. His work spans everything from London’s Design Museum to the Czech Republic’s Cistercian Monastery, Calvin Klein’s store on Madison Ave in New York and a range of private homes and the furnishings to go with them. His work is defined by the use of natural materials, a sensitivity to light and spare spaces that have a feeling of calm.

At a turning point in his life as a young man, Pawson set off on a ‘round the world ticket with nothing to lose. His first stop was in Nagoya, where he had the idea to become a Buddhist monk. When that failed, he went to Tokyo and met Shiro Kuramata.

Despite having no formal qualification as an architect, his accolades are many. They recognise his influence as one of the world’s leading architects. In 2007 he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for his contribution to architecture in the UK.

Listen in as Vince and John discuss knocking down walls to redesign Hester van Royen’s rented flat, the moment Calvin Klein turned up to his office unannounced in 1993 and how starting out can often feel painfully slow.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Children of immigrants are often hard workers; they’re under pressure to live up to their parents’ dreams. And it’s often thought that creativity and hard work don’t go hand in hand.

Jean Lin has proven quite the opposite. Growing up in Massachusetts she was aware she came from a different place to her friends. But she credits her different upbringing, one focused on valuing family, hard work, integrity, with her success.

Lin is the founder and gallerist of the downtown NYC design gallery and studio Colony. The designer’s co-op in Tribeca that’s changing the way New Yorkers shop for their interiors. With Colony, her goal is to support and foster independent designers and makers. Unlike traditional galleries, who take a 40% commission, her model is based on a monthly co-op fee (to cover the rent) and a small 15% commission. Then there’s The Designers’ Residency, an incubator program that mentors the next generation of young designers. She’s also authored a book, ‘What We Keep’, published by Abrams last year. It offers advice from artists and designers on the joy and benefits of living with the things you love.

Lin originally moved to New York to train as a fashion designer at Parsons School of Design. She always knew she didn’t quite fit in with the fashion set. It was when she landed on her love for art and design more broadly that her career really started to sing. Fast forward to today and she has taught at Parsons, and guest lectured everywhere from Rhode Island School of Design to Pratt Institute and Tama Art University in Tokyo to name just a few.

Listen in as Vince and Jean discuss working on J Lo’s fashion brand, having the transformative realisation that design is literally everything around us and why it’s better value to buy it once and buy it well.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.