Discover Alternative Design: The Platform

Get ready for the launch of Alternative Design, a groundbreaking multimedia platform that empowers designers to become catalysts for positive change. Through thought-provoking podcasts, blog articles, immersive videos, and conversations, Alternative Design showcases the latest trends, innovations, and best practices in design, sustainability, technology, and social responsibility. We feature interviews with industry leaders, visionaries, and change-makers who are pushing the boundaries of what's possible and shaping the future of design. Alternative Design is your go-to destination for staying ahead of the curve and making a positive difference. Join us as we launch Alternative Design, your gateway to a world of possibilities in design and beyond.

Check out the Alternative Design blog.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:00

Welcome to the Alternative Design Podcast, where we explore the power of foresight and design to create future-ready spaces. In each episode, we talk to diverse voices to discover the ways our world is changing and uncover insights that will influence the built environment of tomorrow. I'm your host, kaitlin Reed, an interior designer and certified futurist, and I want to help designers think like futurists so we can take actionable steps today to become makers of a better future. This episode, we're doing something a little different. We held our latest virtual panel last week, titled Attracting the New Higher Ed Learner, where we spoke to an education futurist, a dean from one of the top US public universities and a principal of interior architecture at a renowned education design firm. While we work to translate that future-forward conversation into tangible insights for you, we'd like to introduce you to an ecosystem of inspiring content that you can access in the meantime. This is episode 26,. Discover Alternative Design the Platform Born amidst the challenges of 2020, this podcast began as a beacon of hope and inspiration for an industry grappling with the reality of designing spaces in a world where people were hesitant to even gather.

Speaker 1 1:34

What started as a response to a crisis has since transformed into something truly remarkable, since our pilot episode that positioned bacteria as a force for good during a global pandemic. Yeah, that was a risk. The show has become an advocate for change and a challenger of the status quo. It encourages us to reimagine the relationship between people and the places they inhabit, inspiring designers to craft environments that not only captivate but also prioritize the well-being of those who use them, both in the present and those who will experience them in the future. This mission has enabled us to share valuable insights and if you're listening to this episode, you clearly understand how to find the core of our thought leadership. But what you might not know is that we have a ton of multimedia content that's available to you if, say, you're a visual learner, or if you find yourself wanting to read instead of listen, or even if you want to listen to music that keeps you energized during the workday. What I'm talking about is the Alternative Design Platform, and I wanna take three minutes to tell you what's included and where you can find it.

Speaker 1 2:39

We know that our show is cramming a ton of information and insights into a roughly 20 to 25 minute time frame. It's a lot to process and some people may just want to read the highlights at their own pace. Enter the blog. With every episode drop, there is a corresponding blog posted on the Kimball International website under insights that gives you the key takeaways from each episode in just a few sentences. Insights that gives you the key takeaways from each episode in just a few sentences. There's also articles that are topical, featuring trending ideas and concepts in the design industry, and if you're wanting a deeper dive into our forecasts on the future of workplace health and education, they're featured on our blog as well, and we go much deeper than what we're able to stuff into our show.

Speaker 1 3:36

We also have an entire album of music inspired by the podcast. Thank you anywhere near here. You may not know that Kimball International got its start as a piano manufacturer that sold music to the millions, but we're proud of our heritage of craftsmanship, so making your own music just feels right. The last piece of Alternative Design Platform is Alternative Conversations. We get to speak with a ton of incredible designers, innovators and artists, and we wanted a spot where those conversations could live, even if they weren't directly related exactly to the podcast. The videos live on the Kimball International website under the Insights section, and our latest video features acclaimed furniture designer Brad Escalon, and we dive into his design process and his challenge to the design industry to become sustainably driven to his design process and his challenge to the design industry to become sustainably driven.

Speaker 2 4:30

So there's a company that I've been consulting for for the better part of the past year. They had developed a paint interior paint that sequesters carbon, vocs, toxins out of the environment. It's pretty incredible. They do the same with concrete. You know, if you can imagine walking into a space where the fabrics, the carpet, the wood finish, the walls, the paint are actually taking toxins and VOCs out of the environment. To me it's probably the most exciting thing that I'm working on, more than any product, because I think we can get there. I think it takes big-minded companies to be willing to invest in the exploration and the experimentation and the science of it. But you know it's not a one solution fits all it's. You know, here's the process we use. How can we tailor the process to what you need? But yeah, we can walk into a space two years from now. That's just the cleanest environment you know you can imagine.

Speaker 1 5:29

And, as of last Thursday, attracting the New Higher Ed Learner is also posted under Alternative Conversations for you to watch right now. That hour and change convo and whittle that down for you in our next episode, giving you the insights you need to craft learning environments that are going to attract the next generation of learners. And here's a hint, it's not Gen Alpha.

Speaker 3 5:53

Technology and discovery are really playing pivotal roles in what this means and how it's being defined. So, as technology continues to evolve, it is taking away jobs and it is creating jobs, and that is one area where you can see it definitively in education and the transitions in different types of education.

Speaker 4 6:17

Absolutely, and I would add to that we live through a golden age of enormous higher education expansion from the early 80s until about 2012. And ever since then, total enrollment has gone down and since most of American higher education is effectively private, and that is, we depend on tuition for revenue, this is exerting enormous stress which is, in turn, pivoting us to try and expand enrollment through whichever way we can be it online enrollment, international enrollment, more adult learners but hopefully, hopefully, as Fiona pointed out, the transformations of society driven in part by technology, in part by social forces, will send more and more people flocking back to colleges and universities in order to reskill and rethink, in order to prepare themselves for the middle and the later part of the 21st century.

Speaker 1 7:06

We'll cover the tension between in-person and digital learning, student and teacher, mental health, sustainability and reimagining campus amenities. Underlining our recent forecast for the future of education that learning will be everywhere all at once. So head to KimballInternationalcom and select Insights where all of this and more can be found on the Alternative Design platform. And don't forget subscribe to the podcast so that you can be one of the first people to know when the next episode drops. Thank you.