Mile Long Trace Interior Architecture & Interior Design – Details, episodes & analysis

Overview

In this episode of Mile Long Trace we dive into the importance and value of internships in the design profession. We speak from a practitioner and student perspective to highlight how to pay it forward. 

Guest Summary

Katja Marquart is a professor at the University of Wisconsin in the Interior Architecture program within the School of Design and Communication. Katja works with students in her program to aid in internship placement and speaks with us on the role and value of internships.  

In this episode we discuss: 

1. The value of interior design internships from a student and practitioner perspective 

2. What students and practitioners are looking to get out of the experience

3. The reality of how internships weave into the business of design 

4. What skillsets practitioners are looking for

5. Meaningful ways practitioners can engage with interns

6. The difference between mentorship and sponsorship 

In this episode we discuss: 

1. Strategies for taking the WELL Building Exam
2. The importance of designing for building health
3. How to apply the strategies of WELL to the design of a project

“The role buildings can play in human health and well-being has never been more evident or more important. Thanks to an evolving evidence base, we understand more about the relationship between the physical environment and human health than ever before. We know how to create spaces that enhance – rather than hinder – health and well-being. We can measure – and then improve – the quality of our air, water and light. We can design environments that fuel our bodies, move us, keep us connected, inspire our best work and facilitate a good night's sleep.” - WELL

Guest Summary

Becca Dobosh has over 16 years of experience in the interior design industry, with a focus on and passion for sustainability.  For the past thirteen years she has been an integral part of SERA’s Hospitality Studio, which focuses on custom packages for branded hotels in complex, urban environments. Her approach to incorporating sustainability into projects is deeply immersed in biophilic design with an emphasis on creating healthy interior spaces that are grounded in occupant engagement through compelling storytelling. By creating spaces that strengthen the symbiotic relationship between humans and our environment, Becca designs for long-term resiliency and wellbeing.  She is a LEED & WELL AP, and Associate Interior Designer at SERA Architects.

To listen to the show and read the show notes on tips for taking the Well Building exam.

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Interested in being a guest or have a topic covered, contact Mile Long Trace. We love hearing from our guests. 

Till next time keep designing yawl. 

Interior designers have the capacity to produce thought provoking work that is regionally empathetic and culturally diverse. 

When we travel, we open up to observing and learning about other cultures. During the process of observation we break down internal cultural biases. We become empathetic to other ways of living, working and socializing. We learn how to create culturally appropriate responses to global design problems. We increase tolerance among other cultures, religions and race. When we lean into a worldly viewpoint we are one step closer to promoting social justice. In this episode we will explore the importance of travel in the design practice and how to adopt this thinking while we can not travel.

Guest Summary

Casey Martin is an interior designer and educator. She has practiced nationally and internationally on LEED projects in Hawaii and South Korea. Since 2009 Casey has practiced at Mitsunaga & Associates out of Hawaii, supporting the architectural department with planning and interior design services. Casey leads a design practice with Reverie Design Studio. She taught an exploratory course called Multi-global Design working with students creating empathy and culture awareness. Casey has traveled extensively and documents her experience through a travel blog called Land of Marvels.

Read the show notes to gain 6 tips on how to apply travel to your design practice.

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Curious about a topic you would like for us to cover contact us. 

Keep observing, traveling with your minds and designing!  

As designers strive to become more innovative, working in groups is at the root of harvesting a larger breadth of creativity.  Collaboration is a tool for reaching greater innovation and creativity in the design field. In this episode we will offer 10 tips to creating a collaborative culture.

“When we collaborate creativity unfolds across people; the sparks fly faster and the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.  Collaboration drives creativity because innovation always emerges from a series of sparks – never a single flash of insight.” 

- Sawyer

Read the full shownotes on 10 tips to creating collaboration.

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Till next time keep designing y'all. 

How does one foster creativity? In this episode we will talk about the moment in the design process when one needs to summon the creative voices inside. We will unpack how to be creative and offer 10 tips to foster creativity in the design process.

“I believe that inspiration will always try its best to work with you – but if you are not ready or available, it may indeed choose to leave you and to search for a different human collaborator.” - Elizabeth Gilbert, Author of Big Magic

“The shear act of freeing your mind to be creative in another medium can un-lock your brain enough to be able to think more freely, clearly and creativity about your own design.” - Elizabeth

Read the full shownotes to see 10 tips for fostering creativity.

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Curious about a topic you would like for Mile Long Trace to cover contact us. 

Till next time keep designing y'all. 

When we hear the terms equity and inclusive design these days our ears perk up, but if you are like me you are left wondering, what does equity really look like in the built environment and how does a busy designer apply the concept of spatial justice to their practice? In this week’s episode we will look at:

• An overview of what spatial justice means
• Discuss the range of inclusion that should be considered
• Look closely at mobility and access to sharpen your design practice
• Discuss how to adopt a more spatially just practice

Let’s go from awareness to action in your design practice.

“Spatial justice is drilling it down to the individual experience within the design of space. In my mind, spatial justice is about how space is shared among people and how we have biased design. When we design for the “average” human, we really design for no one. It excludes so many experiences. Spatial justice is about bringing the benefits of good design to everybody, especially those who have been historically left out.” – Hannah Silver

Guest Summary

Hannah Silver is founder and inclusive design educator with Informal Function, LLC. I/F’s mission is to empower activist designers of the built environment through spatial justice education and project consultation.

• Formerly she was an inclusive design consultant with AllGo.
• She is an adjunct instructor at PSU in the School of Urban Studies and Architecture
• Previously a sustainability manager at an architectural firm. She is a LEED AP for Homes, EcoDistricts AP, WELL AP, and Fitwel Ambassador.
• Hannah fuses her degrees in architecture from University of Virginia with a focus in Global Sustainability to her Masters in Urban and Regional Planning at Portland State with a focus in land use to her current venture with Informal/Function.

“Design won't save the world, but it can do a lot to shift whether people feel welcome or not in a space. There is a lot that comes from our business culture or social culture, and what we're doing to be inclusive in environments. The more that we have queer and trans people, folks with disabilities and representing neurodiversity, people of size, people of color, and other folks designing in the profession, the more that we will see design that is more inclusive.” – Hannah Silver

Check out the show notes and additional resource on equity in design.

Don't forget to leave a rave review in your favorite podcast app and follow us on instagram to stay in the loop on new episode releases.

Curious about a topic you would like for Mile Long Trace to cover contact us. 

Till next time keep designing y'all. 

In order to minimize the viral spread in the built environment, designers across the world are exploring a vast array of strategies from space planning, to finishes to lighting. In today’s episode we are going to unpack UV lighting to understand the pros and cons of introducing it into mainstream built environments. UV has traditionally been used in health care applications such as surgical exam rooms to remove virus from surfaces. As designers explore how this technology translates to other market sectors we will unpack:

• Effectiveness of UV lighting as a viral treatment
• Safety concerns with using UV in public spaces
• Safe ways UV lighting can be introduced into interior environments
• Clients interest in UV lighting and predictions for technology advancement

“At this the time there is not enough research and education to the public on the difference and effectiveness of UVA, UVB or UVC. The key is to really understand which nanometer range of UV the source is emitting.” - Jesse Smith

“I think UV lighting strategies is a really important conversation to have with clients in light of everything that's going on in the world right now. However, I think the science needs to be stronger in terms of application. My concern is the ads for UV light that kill COVID. We are trying to stay away from eradicating surfaces because of the potential to expose humans.” - Kaylene Campbell 

Read the full shownotes to review the differences between UVA, UVB and UVC. 

Jesse Smith is a Lighting Studio Team Lead and Senior Lighting Designer at Glumac Engineering

• Jesse’s background started in Communication, that lead him to Parson’s School of Design where he received an MFA in Architectural Lighting Design
• He is Lighting Certified with National Council on Qualifications for the Lighting Professions (NCQLP) and a Board Member of Illuminating Society of Engineers (IES)
• Active member in local IES and IALD chapters helping promote better lighting through education
• Projects he has worked on span the globe in a spectrum of project types from medical facilities to higher educational institutions to hospitality projects
• Jesse has extensive experience in exploring new lighting, control and daylighting technology

Kaylene Campbell is a Lighting Designer at Glumac Engineering

• She has an BFA in Interior Designer which allows her to communicate lighting design intent and technical expertise fluently with architectural teams
• She has a deep background as a client manger which enable her to understand clients’ needs and team coordination
• She is currently a member of IIDA and Board Treasure of IES
• Projects she has worked on span the United States in a spectrum of project types from winery tasting rooms, mixed use development, biotechnology facility to multifamily housing projects 
•  Kaylene’s background in sustainability has enabled her to work on projects that utilize Resilient Design and LEED strategies

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Itching for some content to be covered email us at elizabeth@milelongtrace.com. We love to collaborate. 

Till next time keep designing y'all. 

We bring into focus the microbiome of the built environment to understand what is happening on a micro level to interior spaces. In this episode we address what is on designers’ minds right now, COVID-19 in the built environment.

“Designers have a big role to play in the mitigation of virus transfer. Designers also have a role to play in the climate crisis. Buildings consume a lot of energy. While we're talking about biology right now, we really should be talking about energy because they go hand in hand. As we take measures to mitigate COVID-19 many of them have energy implications. They have land implications. They have urban design implications. We can't disregard the energy impact on the climate. We as designers need to think broadly. We have a substantial role to play.”

In this episode we will unpack:

• What the built environment microbiome is
• Differentiate good and bad microbes
• Explore how good microbiome support human health
• Discuss antimicrobial building products
• Strategies designers can apply to reduce the transmission of viruses in the built environment
• How to introduce good microbes into the environment 

Guest Summary

Mark Fretz is an Associate Director of Outreach and Knowledge Exchange at the Institute for Health in the Built Environment, and Research Assistant Professor at University of Oregon. Mark's role entails researching how to design the unseen in the built environment for microbes, molecules to precipitation, carbon and energy in use, in order to promote healthy individuals, healthy communities and a healthy planet. 

IHBE is at the intersection between biology, medicine, chemistry and engineering to look at how to promote a healthy built environment. Currently Mark and the team he works with IHBE are studying the microbiome of the built environment. Recently, they published considerations to reduce COVID-19 transmission, which is titled “2019 novel coronavirus, pandemic built environment considerations to reduce transmission.” We are going to discuss studies they are currently working on to make the built environment healthier for occupants.

Check out the show notes for actionable items to mitigate the spread of infectious diseases in the built environment.

Don't forget to leave a rave review and follow us on instagram to stay in the loop on new episode releases.

Curious about a topic you would like for Mile Long Trace to cover contact us. 

Till next time keep designing y'all. 

Overview   

In a matter of weeks, we have seen our entire health system retract, our economic system crash and our political system divide. Ironic! Guess again. We are in the middle of reorganizing some of the largest systems we value; our health, our economy and our political structure. In today’s episode, we are going to take a deep dive into the concept of design resiliency to unpack and inspire you as a designer to embrace change and sustain your design practice.  

Design Resiliency is the practice of adapting to change. Being nimble, flexible, reflective, adaptive, and even embracing chaos. - Elizabeth Lockwood

“Resilient thinking is about how and why the system as a whole is changing, we are better placed to build a capacity to work with change as opposed to being a victim of it. A resilient system that has the capacity to rebound from disturbances does this by increasing its diversity and redundancy, by forgoing growth and speed in favor of sustainability, and by engaging in a wide range of small local actions that connect to one another.” - Margaret Wheatley

Health, economic and political systems collide. 

Shortly after the world went into the stay at home order due to the COVID-19 outbreak, the conversation shift from human health to economic health and then it quickly became political. We began to divide as a nation and question even our good friends’ political views. It is more apparent then ever how interconnected our human health, economic health and political systems are. When we talk about one these days, we tend to lead into another. So now what? How do we unpack this all to advise our clients to make the best informed decisions when we are in the middle of a massive reorganization of our health, economic and political system. This is where the theory of Design Resiliency can be applied. It is a theory, model and tool to us during different phase of design or during business restructuring. 

Moving forward through this episode I will speak on two different levels. One being the notion of having a healthy design practice during a recession and the second notion designing in response to pandemics. 

The full shownotes include: adaptive cycle diagrams, key quotes and related architectural references. Check them out!

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Have any questions, comments or feedback we would love to muse with you! 

Till Next Time Keep Designing Y'all.

Design Justice is the intersection of race, culture and architecture. 

With protesters across the nation calling upon communities saying, “it isn’t enough to be silent anymore.” The design community should do more, a lot more, but how? Even though the systems at play are so massively broken, doing something is a start.  

In this episode Elizabeth explores how architects and interior designers can start to address social change and equity in the design process.

“We need to adopt a new role as a facilitator, not the all high and mighty practitioner that knows best. We need to be humble. We need to be vulnerable. We need to be willing to step down and recognize that the skill sets lie in leading teams through the design process. We need to elevate the voice of others. Now that is Design Justice. ”

It is highly recommend you reference the show notes for this episode. The quotes brought forward and resources from the show are worth a second read.

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Till Next Time Keep Designing Y'all.