Monocle’s design editor, Nic Monisse, reflects on some of the conversations shared with creatives this year as 2024 comes to a close. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This is Monocle on Design Extra.
It's a short show to accompany our weekly program where we discuss everything from architecture and craft to furniture and fashion.
I'm Mailie Evans.
As we come to the close of yet another year, it is of course the time for introspection.
Over the last 12 months we've had the opportunity to spend speak with many a designer, maker and creative to reflect on the impact of some of these conversations and the lessons he's taken from 2024 is Monocle's design editor Nick Moniese.
Over the festive period, I always find myself reflecting on the previous 12 months in anticipation of what to expect from the year ahead.
As we venture into 2025, I'm going to be particularly upbeat.
Why?
Well, in 2024 I spoke to a host of who gave plenty of reason to be optimistic.
Here are three industry specific highlights.
Architecture UK based designer Alison Brooks thinks that while architects are working hard to address the climate crisis, many are missing another.
There's also a crisis of meaning, she told me as we toured her new building cadence in London's King's Cross.
We can start to address this by recalibrating our relationship to nature, she said.
Buildings are at their best when they work with the prevailing conditions, embedding into distinct hillsides or embr environmental quirks.
It's an approach that enhances the spirit of sight and the enjoyment of inhabitants too.
Graphic Design Mark Gowing is one of Australia's leading graphic designers and artists who launched his new type practice, the letters, in late 2024.
His advice to young designers is to view AI and new technologies as an opportunity.
I began my career as computers started happening, explained Gowing.
If you're worried about machines taking your job, then I'm not sure you're actually thinking to.
For the generation that grew up casting type out of metal, I'm sure that they thought the computer technology was the devil.