Ep. 130: Award-Winning Architect Jordan Goldstein
Award-winning architect and current Head of Global Design and Innovation for Gensler, Jordan Goldstein, discovered his passion for architecture at age 5 while visiting construction sites with his mother. From LEGO bricks to skyscrapers, he’s built his life’s work with an interdisciplinary approach and a focus on elevating the human experience. A believer in architecture’s role in supporting communities, today he’s an educator and sought-after spokesperson on the future of design both domestically and globally.
Read the full transcript here.
Jordan Goldstein: What is an architecture of optimism in a post-pandemic world? It’s architecture not for the sake of architecture, it’s not to glorify form but to express it’s purpose in every aspect of the design.
Amy Devers: Hi everyone, I’m Amy Devers and this is Clever. Today I’m talking to Jordan Goldstein, an award-winning architect who is currently the head of global design and innovation for Gensler. He’s led the design and project delivery of renowned commercial projects in the US and abroad, including Beijing’s CP Towers, China’s Duke Kunshan University campus and Washington, DC’s Yards Waterfront neighborhood. Additionally, he’s an educator and sought after spokesperson on the future of design both domestically and globally. But what makes this conversation so fascinating is his interdisciplinary approach and his focus on how architecture can elevate the human experience. Let's hear from Jordan.
JG: I’m Jordan Goldstein. I’m in Washington DC and I am the global director of design for Gensler and I have been doing architecture and design for my entire career and love it because it is an awesome opportunity to make the world a better place through the power of design.
AD: I always like to get the setup, like how did you get to be you and to do that I like to go all the way back to zero. So will you take us back to your childhood and where you grew up and maybe a little bit about what fascinated your young mind?
JG: So, I grew up in Rockville, Maryland, which is not that far outside of DC and close family, I have two younger sisters. You know, we’re in a small townhouse and when I was around five years old my parents started looking for a house. And you know, my dad is an attorney and he was working in DC, my mom was a school teacher and during the days when he was down at the office, she would take me around while she looked at houses.
And we would see houses in various points of construction and again, I’m five, so I’m not really probably absorbing the full intent of what they’re showing, but we’d come home and she would plop me on the floor next to a pile of Legos and she would call my father and walk him through what she had seen. And I started just playing with Legos and I think probably in my young mind I was trying to replicate what I was seeing and I just started getting fascinated by things that could be built.
And so Legos were really the catalyst, I would say, at the age of five, that got me wanting to be an architect. So since the age of five, I’ve wanted to be an architect and that’s been the goal.
AD: Wow! I think that’s really fascinating that from a young age you saw houses as they were being built and were able to kind of make that translation from their in-process stages to Legos then, to playing with it with your own mind and hands, but recognizing that it becomes a dwelling that really influences people’s lives.
JG: Well, I give my parents a lot of credit because they encouraged it. So I’m, I’m not sure I was building anything coherent at the age of five out of Legos, but they were reassuring in saying, ah, okay, that is a house, that is a building. When I see Legos, it immediately brings me back to those moments and just the idea that you could craft and you could create and you could start to imagine these as places, as spaces, was just so fascinating at a young age.
And I think it really got me excited, kind of making that connection between what you’re building and then what you’re seeing. And I loved going out to those construction sites when we were doing those house tours and a lot of times you may see a model home and then you walk over and the next house is like halfway through construction. So being able to kinda see a finished product and then something in production was just awesome. And very, I think inspirational at a young age.
And it just gave me this feeling that this, the idea of design and architecture you know, would be a profession where there’s the opportunity to kind of take arts and crafts to a whole new level, right, and be able to do something that could actually really change how people experience the world.
AD: So, you were conscious then that there were humans involved in making all of these choices about how these houses got constructed, it wasn’t an abstraction to you?
JG: Right and seeing workers on the construction sites and actually, one of the things I appreciate my parents did is they didn’t just like walk on a construction site and walk away. Like we would sit there and watch stuff getting built and for someone at that age [0.05.00] seeing walls go up, seeing dirt being moved, it was fascinating. So I think it was this interesting kind of early juxtaposition of putting things together and then also seeing what the end result of that was, which was, I think, really probably just instilled in me the idea that you know, there is this whole nature of craft in design.
It’s not just about doodles on paper, it’s about really thinking through what the whole experience would be of actually conceiving of an idea and then also making that, you know, all the way through to a built reality. And then I think the other thing that was really awesome about this whole experience is being able to see all these different workers doing different things on a job site, really was an early introduction to the whole idea that this is not a solo art.
That this is really about collaboration. You’re not gonna get anything built if you’re just trying to do it yourself, so being able to think through the different players involved and how do you really play to everybody’s strengths to get something truly great.
AD: I had a similar experience; I mean it was sort of self-guided. But in the fourth grade my elementary school went through a major renovation. So for that summer after fourth grade my playground was the construction site and I discovered that if I went there on weekends and after everybody was done working, that I could climb up the scaffolding, I could go into the unfinished spaces, I could check out pallets and pallets of cinder blocks that I could rearrange, like giant Legos and I made forts. And I wish that I had just had somebody there kind of explaining to me what it all did, but I still sort of figured it out through deduction.
JG: What a transformational experience, right -
AD: Yes.
JG: To be able to see all these components, it’s like a buffet -
AD: Yes, 100% and it was so much more exciting than a regular playground that was all finished and -
JG: Right, yeah, much better to see that than the actual finished product in that case and to be able to put two and two together. I still get excited, when I go out to a construction site and it’s just raw materials and it’s the early stages of construction, I still get so excited about it and it’s just like that realm of possibilities, right?
AD: Yeah, well you definitely found your way into the right profession then if it’s still so exciting to you. What did this translate to in your teenage years? I mean you sorta knew you wanted to be an architect from a young age, it sounds like you didn’t have to do growing pains in that area, but I’m sure you weren’t spared all the awkwardness.
JG: Right, no, no growing pains in that area [laughter]. I guess, the funny thing, I guess, for me was, it felt like once I knew what I wanted to do, then it was like, what’s the quickest path from A to B? And you know, and how do I make sure I’m prepared for that path. So aside from all the normal stuff of teenage years of hanging with friends and you know, obviously going to school and trips with friends or family,
I did a lot of drawing and it wasn’t like sketching, like taking a pencil and a sketch book and going out and sketching landscape and so forth. It was kind of hardcore drawing and I think that’s, I’m not sure I really at that time knew what sketching was, it was more about taking rulers, taking triangles and the other accoutrements of the profession that my parents exposed me to and just sitting there and drawing house plans, floor plans, like late night drawing tons of plans.
And you know, whether it was small homes or large homes or big buildings or small, it didn’t really matter and it was just a lot of late nights drawing. And I forget that rule of like 10,000, if you keep doing something over and over again You get so familiar with it. So what I realized was that was really good training in seeing space as you draw it. So like rather than just, it’s just lines on paper, just really truly trying to extrude those lines and imagine those as 3D realities.
AD: Wow!
JG: Yeah, heavy, heavy for a teenager. [Laughs]
AD: Well, I mean I’m fascinated because I’m trying to work my way into your mind there because this is you imagining space that doesn’t exist and putting lines to it, right, this isn’t you sort of redrawing spaces that you’ve seen -
JG: Right.
AD: This is you designing and putting lines to it.
JG: Right and I have this distinct memory of one day my grandmother, who also was, the whole family really encouraged it, which was great, taking me to an architect’s office with the drawings that I had been doing, again, I’m a teenager so these aren’t really, I wouldn’t call them very proficient drawings, and sitting down with an architect and saying here’s what he’s doing and what do you do, help explain what you do to him and then what do you think of these drawings.
And I remember the guy looking through the drawings and he’s like, oh, you know what, okay, well these, this kind of orientation of space makes sense, where you put the plumbing, where you put the kitchen, you know, all that kind of makes sense and that was actually really reassuring. It was actually kind of a wonderful moment to get exposure to what someone actually does in this profession and at a relatively early age. And know that what I was doing wasn’t so off base. But I did find you know, Rockville, growing up in Rockville and with DC, you know, is in immediate vicinity, we went down to DC a lot and going down and driving around the monuments and driving around buildings that really are truly iconic pieces of architecture and certainly stand for so much in the history of our country. That was really interesting to be able to sit there, okay, I’m drawing this house, let’s say, and I can imagine what it could look like but at the same time you know, over the weekend I’m driving down with my family and we’re seeing the Lincoln Memorial or the Washington Monument.
And realizing that oh, here are buildings that have stood for a long time and have such architectural significance, how could architecture be more than just enclosure?
AD: Yes, because you’re getting a sense of the symbolism and sculptural and cultural meaning that architecture can represent, in addition to its shelter properties -
JG: Absolutely and then also realizing that okay, well this is one particular societies view of iconic architecture, what does the rest of the world look like.
AD: Right, oh my gosh, your brain must have been so hungry for exploration!
JG: Exploding, and largely our travel as a family had been really domestic. So we did family road trips to different parts of the country, my parents were really big on trying to expose us to different aspects of the country, just national parks and history and so forth, which was certainly amazing.
But I also really wet my appetite, what does the rest of the world look like and it wasn’t until I got into college that I had some opportunities to kind of open that window and look at a much more holistic picture of how different communities look at architecture.
AD: Well, I’m glad you said that because that’s exactly what I want to know, is how did you do that exploration and what were the college years like for you? You already knew you were gonna study architecture from five, so it was probably a matter of just picking your schools and then figuring out how to get out to see the rest of the world, yeah?
JG: Yeah, it would have been good if there was like instant degree [laughter] but having to go through the rigors of architectural training was definitely a surprise. I mean the late nights in design studios on a college campus, well-known, the lights are always on and the students are always there. I definitely experienced that. But I went to the University of Maryland for undergraduate, which was an amazing deep dive in what I would call the tectonics of architecture.
Like how things get built but it was also a great, just overall college experience. There was really a mix of a liberal education mixed with hardcore architecture. I found that I was really interested in literature and creative writing, so I got a minor in literature. And what I realized though, that doing all this exploration meant that when I got to the end of my undergraduate time I was actually short some credits. And I needed to finish off a couple of classes to graduate and that would have to be over the summer.
I had two choices. I could either take those classes in College Park, Maryland, which is where the University of Maryland is based, or travel and I could take them abroad. So there was an opportunity to take them in Italy. So you know, definitely check that box, right. I’m going to Italy! So I went to Italy, I’d never been to Europe. Which was awesome, so basically I finished off my University of Maryland education by going to Rome with other students and being based in Rome where the classroom was the city.
AD: Wow.
JG: There was no classroom, so every day we were out looking at buildings, drawing, sketching, understanding history understanding how culture interacts with history and with the built environment. It was a fascinating kind of eye-opening experience and at the same time it was also finishing the credits I needed to get a degree [laughter]. But it showed me something that I think really got me interested in global architecture and design which was, I was seeing a particular point of view.
I was seeing western architecture still and the amazing architecture of Rome and how it has endured for centuries and eons and so forth, but what I realized is, I wanted to get another perspective. I really needed to see eastern architecture, eastern philosophies. So I chose the University of Pennsylvania for grad school, for two reasons. One, at the time they were the only university in the US offering a Japan program and two, is they also were really getting into digital explorations of design.
AD: Oh?
JG: That was kind of at the advent of digital technology coming into architecture. So mid-90s, great time to go there. So I found that that was like a full-scale emersion in digital design and what does it mean to explore the 3D implications of your design ideas and understand that design intent well before any hammer was put to nail.
AD: When you say the implications, do you mean things like wind and casting shadows and -
JG: All those things, through renderings and animations and 3D models of building, digital 3D models of buildings.
AD: Okay.
JG: And that was new to me and it was also really, largely new to the profession at that time. So this is still the age of big, clunky machines and printers that are the size of rooms, you know, so seeing that was and experiencing that was really interesting. It’s like you’re okay, well all right, instead of drawing a line on paper, where the paper may be, let’s say it’s 20 inches by 30 inches and that’s my parameters, I’m drawing in digital space and there are no parameters. Like I could keep drawing that line forever, right?
AD: Right.
JG: So that was like mind-blowing and then in the middle of all that I went to Japan and they had this really awesome program where you would be studying with a Japanese master in Japan and it wasn’t just going and like exploring buildings, it was literally going and learning about traditional Japanese construction and traditional Japanese architecture. And travelling around the country with this Japanese master and appreciating it from his eyes, which was such a profound change from the experiences in Rome.
AD: Yeah, because the philosophies are so different but also being able to travel with the master and get his particular perspective on how the success or lack of success of certain types of execution must have been really informative.
JG: And seeing buildings that were built a thousand plus years ago that had no nails and were all done with beautiful craftsmanship and yet they still stand. You know, one of the things I really loved about his way of teaching was, if you’re gonna go around the country and experience these places, you actually need to stay in these spaces. So what he would do is like when we would go and look at Shinto temples, we would actually stay in the temple.
We would stay overnight on tatami mats on the floor, wake up when the Buddhist monks were doing their chants and like you’re really experiencing the space.
AD: Yeah, oh how important that must have been to your development. I mean buildings are so theoretical until they’re not [laughs].
JG: Right exactly, they’re real and you’re like wow.
AD: Yeah, so to be able to, I don’t know, really experience all these different types of spaces, well, that just adds to your sort of toolkit and repertoire for how certain things and materials go together to create environments.
JG: It does and there was one final kind of blast, I would call it, from the college experiences, which is when I returned from Japan back to Philadelphia, you know, I was like, my mind was like totally reeling from these different experiences, within a relatively short period seeing and being immersed in western architecture and then being immersed in eastern philosophies and design vocabulary. Then like you know, what do you do?
I did an internship at an architect’s office in Philly and one day that architect came in and he said, you know, he announced aloud into the office, who is really good at model building and he looks over at me and he’s like, you, you can build good models. I need you to go to Zuni, New Mexico and stay on the Zuni Native American reservation and work with the tribe to build a model of their ancient pueblo such that they can use that model as a teaching tool to help the next generation understand how to maintain it and keep it something that lasts for centuries.
AD: Oh wow!
JG: Right.
AD: What an honor!
JG: It was so cool!
AD: Wow!
JG: And literally the first day I got out there, you know, I didn’t know what to expect and I get onto the reservation, meet some members of the tribe and they come in and they’re like, are you ready for dancing? And I’m like, what, what do they mean? What? Dancing? I didn’t know I’d be dancing. And they’re like, it’s been a drought and I’m like, oh my gosh, they mean rain dances -
AD: Wow.
JG: And Zuni is a closed reservation, so it was an honor to be on the grounds and it was even more of an honor to be brought into their Pueblo kind of main square and watch these traditional rain dances and see this architecture in the way it was meant to be used which was, again, a mindblowing experience right on the heels of coming back from Asia.
AD: Wow, I’m so jealous of these experiences, but I also have a real practical question which is, what kind of relationship was in place to facilitate bringing you onto the reservation and are Is that an existing framework that we can inject some energy into?
JG: Yeah, I mean definitely today with certainly all the conversations we’re seeing about the social inequalities and inclusiveness in communities and making sure that all communities are represented and you know, looked after. It is a relevant conversation for today, for sure. What facilitated it back then was one of the members of that architecture firm was affiliated with Penn and so he taught there and had applied for a Getty Grant to work with the Zuni tribe.
AD: Okay.
JG: And they had just gotten the grant and it’s a program that lasted for many years to be able to get students connected in with the Zuni Native American tribe and to help and to work together. And what was, I think really interesting thing, and there’s so much learning that can happen through these collaborations, is you know, now sustainability is such a, an important term and resilience in our global environment, but you know, here’s a Native American tribe that is really understanding what it means to use materials that are of the earth.
And seeing that and that Pueblo is built out of materials that are literally brought forth from the ground, right there, was a really early, you know your comment about toolkit is so right on, it was a really interesting tool to add to the toolkit about how do we look at the environment we’re in, the sites we’re looking at and recognizing that there’s potentially materials right there to build with that can better those communities.
AD: Wow, what a formative experience and would you say that, do you feel good about the model that you were able to build for a teaching tool, you feel good about -
JG: Yeah, I think was, yeah, I think it was pretty good. It’s always; I guess aesthetics are certainly in the eye of the beholder right? In my opinion, for a college student it was a good model and the good thing was, what ended up happening is when I finished working there, someone else came in to pick up where I left off and they were able to just keep going, so that was reassuring.
But it did leave in, kind of somewhere in me that I wasn’t really sure how to kind of tug at that thread, how do you help communities. And you know, fast forward many years and we can certainly talk about it, at Gensler, recognizing that since we are a global firm, are there ways to do this you know, in any community, globally.
And that led to a conversation with some folks in Thailand that brought us into the slums of Bangkok and really working to, with residents there in the field to understand how to appreciate their communities in different ways and how to make their lives better in those communities. And that was about seven/eight years ago, so that connection between the mid-90s and a latter part of my career, the threads were sown at an early age to be able to recognize that there are these needs and to be, for me to then be at a place like Gensler where we’re able to do that, to work with communities, to work with people wherever they are, in more of a borderless environment, to help try to better their world through design.
AD: Well, I definitely want to dig into that project then, it sounds fascinating. But before we deconstruct that, will you just sort of connect the dots between this internship or this experience with the Native Americans to today? I mean today you’re the head of global design and innovation at Gensler, you’ve got many skyscrapers and built projects and awards to your name. How long have you been at Gensler and how did you build your career to be able to get to this point?
JG: So right after finishing at the University of Pennsylvania I was really attracted to Gensler. So I came to Gensler right after graduate school and the reason I was attracted to the firm was, it was interesting, going around interviewing at different firms, one of the things that just struck a chord with me is that Gensler, at the time, you know, was a growing firm, it was certainly a global firm, but not nearly at the scale we’re at now.
But there was this conversation about culture and people at those early interviews and design was not overtly stated. It was almost like an undercurrent to the entire conversation and the woman that was interviewing me at the time, Diane Hoskins, who was leading the Washington DC office, who is now co-CEO of the firm, you know, it was such a, I think, fascinating way to look at design and really connected with me, with the experiences I had, learning about architecture through the lenses of these different cultures.
So the idea to come into a place that was really about people and about culture and recognizing that design is a vehicle that allows you to really enhance people’s worlds of work, or live or play in a way that is meaningful to them, that was, I think, really compelling. Now, that being said, I still came in as like a junior designer, so it was really kind of early days and in the design profession there’s such a built in norm of apprenticeship, go in and learn at the hands of those that have been doing it a while.
Which is wonderful, but at the same time I was coming out of Penn, like so many others at the time, coming out of school that have just been exposed to all these new digital tools which the design firms at the time you know, all of them were just learning to play with. So it was an interesting time to come in and be learning as a junior person but at the same time recognize that there’s some skillsets that me and others graduating at that time period were exposed to, that actually could make us teachers in that environment. So we could be teaching at the same time that we’re learning.
AD: Yes, and I think that continues now because technology and ideology and philosophy is sort of evolving so fast that I think relationships of learning are much more of a mutual exchange. The elders have wisdom and experience and the younger people have idealism, energy and new practices to share.
JG: So true and I think what’s amazing now is, I think we’re at another point of inflection. If the mid-90s were kind of the advent of the digital wave, first wave into architecture and design, we’re at this next kind of tidal wave or tsunami where the whole idea of AI and direct to manufacturing right from design to fabrication, 3D printing and making, all those technologies are at play causing those of us that are in the profession, those of us that are coming into the profession from school, to recognize that the toolbox has never been richer for designers and architects to think differently about how they go about making and designing places.
AD: Well, and I think it’s really interesting what you said too about what attracted you to Gensler because it seems like there was this conversation of people and culture first and using design to service that as opposed to using design to impose your design philosophy onto the people and culture, which is a pretty important distinction [laughs].
JG: A very important distinction, you’re spot on. And it’s that interesting flip of the lens where it’s not architecture for architecture sake, it’s really about understanding whose the audience, whose the users and what do they, what are their pain points you know, everyone has got, depending on what the project type is, there’s always these pain points and how do you look to those rather than just wanna lay a pencil down on paper and start drawing something.
AD: So, how does this all apply, this and your interest in communities and your, when you work with an organization like Gensler and have the keys to the world, essentially, how did this all come together in the Bangkok project that you were talking about? Can we look at that?
JG: Sure, yeah, it’s interesting. There was this whole kind of Segway that started at the beginning of the recession in 2008 and you know, that moment when work was really drying up in many parts of the world, certainly in the US, it was a time to look at where are the opportunities, where’s the work? And I followed this trail, this bread crumb trail that got me from DC to India to China, to Thailand, all through some client relationships and the Thai relationship was one that really came out of work that I had been doing with our teams in Shanghai, and this was all, again, playing out, against the backdrop of a recession.
And one of the things we realized that in Thailand, just getting started in Bangkok, we were working with a client there, a wonderful client, that is called the CP Group, and also another client tied in with them, which is called Magnolias and they have this interest in, not just development but also in helping and bettering communities. So one of the things I started talking about with them at the time was there’s an opportunity to continue to do development, but at the same time you know, is there a way that we can actually tie it all together, growing the next generation of architects and designers.
And maybe we can actually bridge the gap between cultures and actually blend students from different parts of the world together on a common problem. And so we stitched together students from the US and students from two different, so two different universities in the US, two different universities in Thailand and they worked together in the field with us. You know, we spent about two and a half weeks in the slums of Bangkok really going through and understanding, meeting residents, meeting community leaders there.
Understanding what are the pain points there and then coming back and all of them got an internship at Gensler to work the problem. Let’s design for what we saw, you know, we got to understand all of these different audience members, these users and we got to really listen to their challenges, how do we collectively, practitioners and students, solve for that? And we did that for about six to eight weeks after that.
And came up with some really awesome solutions, really intriguing solutions that we presented back to the community. We shared the ideas and we felt like it was potentially a new model, a new paradigm of teaching design because you’re in a sense bringing together clients, practitioners and students and faculty in a way that’s really kind of action learning oriented. It’s solving real problems that people have in their communities, in their cities and I think it’s one that if you look at all the issues we are seeing today that are playing out on a global scale [0.35.00] that’s probably really relevant to the world today.
AD: Oh, I absolutely think so. I think the community involvement is a huge part of it and not just the ethnography at the front end to learn the pain points and come up with solutions but the part about going back to them and presenting possible solutions. When the community is co-architecting the solutions then they have investment, they feel reflected and they have some sense of ownership and pride of place. And I think that is huge, nobody wants to live in a place that was forced upon them.
JG: Agreed and for us as architects and designers to tease out what is the pride of place that they either have or that they need, or want,
AD: Can you share some of the pain points and some of the solutions?
JG: Sure yeah, and it’s led to some other things too, which I think are, I think even more you know, now opportunistic given what we’re seeing in the world today. A couple of solutions that we were able to collaborate on and develop was, you know, two things related to the whole notion of community. Talking to a lot of the residents there, there was a pride of place. You know, they actually really appreciated the interactivity they were having with the others that were there, that there was a multigenerational sense of belonging.
So how do you support that notion of community? So one of the things we designed was this model, I’ll call it a prototype for a community center that would bring these generations together and would allow them to gather in point because in these slums you know, while there were so many residents, in a sense, living in extremely tight densities, there wasn’t space for the community to gather.
So being able to afford them that space but then recognize that you have to have the space be able to handle the intense climate, the issues of flooding, heavy rains that you certainly can get there, but make it a welcoming place. And then what are some of the activities that you could do there? One of the things we realized is that there’s some amazing craftsmanship in those communities and it wasn’t really being put to the ultimate level of use.
So are there products that the community can create, furniture, that the community could create using materials that are found, objects there, that would create furniture products that could then be sold to those in the larger community beyond, to help raise money that supports the community. And so we developed a series of products that they could make using materials and components that they have at hand.
So whether that’s tables or benches or chairs, you know, that were very, you know, easily made by the craftsmen that were there, that these were things that could be commercialized or that they could be utilizing and getting revenue for their community. And that led me to really realize that there are so many different ways to think about teaching today and bringing the problems of society into the classroom in ways where students aren’t just sitting there absorbing it, but they’re actually getting their hands around those problems and the classroom becomes, in a sense, almost a real time studio environment where they’re interacting with clients.
They’re interacting with community members and practitioners, so it doesn’t create that chasm where you finish school and then you enter the real world and there’s like a disconnect between what you learned and what you’re actually practicing.
AD: Right, because in school you’re allowed to let your imagination run wild, which is great on some levels, but it doesn’t necessarily strengthen the real world connections that you’re talking about. So these kind of real world workshops also allow the student to develop a real framework for a creative process that they can use out in the world.
JG: Exactly, and it exposes them to a broader toolset at a younger age that just makes their, I think, their ability to jump into the career, like an early springboard rather than the slow ramp up that was the conventional norm for an architect or designer.
AD: So is this kind of thinking why that you’re also drawn to teaching because you are also a professor
JG: I love it. I find that teaching definitely grows the next generation but it, I think it’s like kind of doing my part and a lot of my colleagues, again, also teach, to build a stronger bridge between academia and practice. You know, I learn so much by being in the classroom with students and I’ll freely admit, it helps me feel younger, so that’s always a good thing, right?
AD: Yes.
JG: But there is something about being on a college campus and it’s that whole idea of the possibilities. It’s inspirational and you see all these people that are going through this learning process that will be a launching pad for them in society but at the same time, you know, you hope that that campus is a safe environment where they can experiment, they can explore and they can really innovate. So being able to be a part of that is thrilling.
And to be able to do that in addition to the daily work I’m doing from a global design perspective, I think just makes it much more of a well-rounded view of the world.
AD: I wholeheartedly agree. I’ve done a bit of teaching as well and I’ve done a fair amount of school and the college campus environment, to me, like the most apt metaphor is it’s a greenhouse and it’s just -
JG: That’s a great metaphor yes!
AD: It’s so rich you can, it’s like humid and you can smell and the growth and the soil just smells like nutrients and the chlorophyll is in the air [laughs] and things are just growing and blooming. And it’s just so rich.
JG: Yeah, endless opportunities, endless possibilities. I agree with you and to be able to help to influence students, you know, I’ve fortunately been able to teach at many different universities now and I love to be able to experience different campuses and to try out different models for teaching. But the common denominator is trying to bring in these real world problems into the classroom and in some cases I’ve done it where it’s product based, where we bring in actual product manufacturers and they drop a problem into the class and the class is actually designing products. And then others where it’s related to kind of big scale buildings and others where it’s even bigger scale, like urban plans or cities.
AD: One of the other things that’s really great about working so closely with the younger generation is that they aren’t jaded yet. And they are very idealistic frequently. I mean you sort of need to be to throw yourself into the rigors of architecture and the idea of building a better tomorrow. And you speak about the architecture of optimism and designing to elevate the human experience. So maybe you can teach us a little bit now about your creative process and what this means and what are some specific examples of elevating the human experience?
JG: Sure, it is such an unusual time, in so many ways, right now and I think we see this, for me and my colleagues at Gensler, not just in the US, but we’re global so we’re looking at this, all these different cultures and all these different societies, recognizing that there’s this confluence of challenges as we think about people re-engaging with their communities post-pandemic. Against this backdrop we certainly have the pandemic itself, we have economic distress, we have social inequality, we have civic unrest.
All of that leads me to believe that this is a moment to think about an architecture of optimism and I think in order to do that we have to start with what’s the definition of optimism. You know, I looked it up, thinking about today and one of the ones I found was a hopefulness and confidence about the future. And there’s another one which is a tendency to look on the more favorable side of events to expect the most favorable outcome. And then two more that I thought were good were a belief that good ultimately predominates over evil in the world. And a belief that goodness pervades reality.
So if that’s, if we take those as the baseline definitions of optimism, what is an architecture of optimism in a post-pandemic world? And I think we feel, through the research we’ve been doing, throughout Gensler and certainly from my own personal experiences, it’s architecture that is empathetic and inspirational. It’s causing you to appreciate the places and spaces that you’re in. It’s architecture that connects us to nature, to the outdoors.
It brings natural light in, but as I mentioned earlier, it’s architecture not for the sake of architecture. It’s not to glorify form but to express its purpose in every aspect of the design. And I guess when we think about a post-pandemic world, we think that it’s architecture that makes people feel safer. It’s architecture that can trust and maybe promotes wellness and celebrates life and certainly given what we’re seeing in the last few weeks, that it supports inclusion and diversity and frankly, supports the human experience at every scale and level of our daily lives.
AD: How do you do that?
JG: Well, that’s certainly the challenge right and I think it is the question. I definitely feel like what you were saying earlier is so spot on, which is, you know, being able to make sure that the community is involved in the process. And that it isn’t a bunch of designers in the corner trying to solve for a problem that they may not fully understand.
AD: Right.
JG: So I definitely believe that now more so than ever before, it injects a period into the design process of listening, learning and understanding.
AD: And a diversity of perspectives.
JG: Absolutely, yes,
AD: That’s part of listening, learning and understanding but it almost needs to be spelled out so explicitly because there’s no, because as you learned when you put the US students with the Thai students, I’m sure there was tons of cultural information that got transmitted there, that you never would have had access to when you’re just trying to understand it from an anthropological perspective.
JG: Yeah and your comment about anthropological is so spot on. I remember in one of my early studio experiences, growing and building a studio at Gensler, you know, I really, I’ve always believed in an interdisciplinary approach to design, it’s kind of what attracted me to so many different moves in my journey. That being able to have a studio that’s filled with different skill sets, was really key. So that you have the cultural anthropologist at the table, you have architects, interior designers, industrial designers, graphic designers, web designers, you know, all around the table and then you bring the community in right? So that you now have a design that’s made richer by the voices of many rather than being owned by any one voice.
AD: So interdisciplinary always has made a lot of sense to me and I’ve also just personally really reacted not favorably to being pigeon-holed or siloed.
JG: Right, yeah. [Laughs] I agree with you there.
AD: It makes me so itchy and uncomfortable and just frankly mad, but yet there are also challenges and roadblocks to that everywhere. So part of the practice must be a kind of finessing of the situation in order to encourage interdisciplinary participation.
JG: Right, I agree with you and it’s interesting. I feel like in those situations and what I’ve experienced over the years is that you know, all of those moments still need a conductor of the symphony -
AD: Yeah!
JG: It needs someone that can really, that’s not after anything about themselves, it’s actually about really recognizing the strengths of everyone around the table, kind of the aces and spaces of everybody and getting everyone to play to their strengths. And then you can potentially get the best of everybody on the table in a way that is truly like enhancing whatever the problem is. Whatever the strategy is and the solution, and that’s challenging. I think that’s challenging, you know, in so many respects and it requires, you know, I think an ability to kind of step back and recognize, trying to put ourselves in the shoes of others.
Back to that idea of empathetic design, what’s the motivation and what are the issues that the other person across the table maybe coming to this situation with. And how do we make sure that they’re appreciated and that they’re recognized in a way that they feel that they can contribute openly to the engagement.
AD: Yes and that’s more important than ever now, especially as we’re becoming so hyper conscious of how some voices don’t feel safe in expressing or that they have a real open pathway to contribution.
JG: Right and I’m with you and so many, there’s so much pain points that we’re seeing exposed over these last few months in so many different ways, that it just shows that the architects and designers today really have to recognize the sensitivities that are there, that are just inherent, that need to be appreciated in order to kind of get to the opportunities for design.
AD: Agreed and I also think it’s such an amazing opportunity because all these pain points are being laid bare and are starting to be sort of understood by the general public in a more visceral and more graphic way. It puts a lot more pressure on, and responsibility on the people who are shaping the world, and the built world for tomorrow, to really, really address these sort of cancers in our society and, and design for more, you talked about designing for wellbeing and you’ve also talked about for creating more resilient communities and I think that is such, I think society depends on it, otherwise we will collapse.
JG: Yeah and I think that it says that this may be one of the most pivotal moments in design, in history. In a way that we look at all these issues and that there’s this amazing opportunity with this convergence of technology that we’ve never really seen before, into design, recognizing the issues that are at play in our communities at large, that we really have this moment to think about how we are shaping the future of our cities and our communities.
And to do so in ways that could really enhance and elevate the experience for those that are living in those cities or those that move to those cities in ways that we never have before.
AD: So just to kind of add some more detail to that idea, can you give us some examples or some ideas that you’re toying with?
JG: We’ve been looking at it, pre-pandemic we were looking at how do we approach the future of cities with a resilient mindset? How do we bring this, what we’ve been calling our global cities climate challenge to the table, which is really challenging every project, every client that we’re working with, every community that we engage with, to think about sustainability at a totally different level.
With the onset of the pandemic we started to weave in thinking about how do we make it more about global wellness, where it’s actually trying to make the world healthier and better for all of us, right? Not just a better planet, but a better place to live in, that we’re truly enhancing and elevating the experiences for all. And then you add in the other experiences with the economy. You add in the social inequalities that have been laid bare and the civic unrest and it really is an opportunity to think very differently about what does it mean to have a town square, you know a plaza?
What does it mean to have mixed use? And what does that mixed use equation really want to dial itself to, recognizing everything we’ve been experiencing over the last couple of months. You know, what it’s allowed us to do is look at some of these problems with, I think a really fresh perspective with our clients. So there’s been mixed used projects that we’ve been looking at, you know, in some of our communities that start to think about, you know, how do we actually create places for community to gather, in a safe and healthy manner.
How do we create buildings that actually, you know, for those mixed use components, that have wellness wove into them. So they are healthy buildings, they are buildings that actually allow you know, recognize where they are in the climate, in a sense that they can have, potentially breathable skins. We did a tower in Pittsburgh for PNC that is a, when it was built a few years ago it was the greenest building in North America and it had a breathable skin to it. Such that on, it had tied into technology that recognize that when it was good weather days, that the skin literally opened up and there’s natural ventilation flowing through the building.
So imagine that work place environment versus say a sealed one, you know, and being able to have that opportunity to have that fresh air and be able to feel like you’re in a healthier building is important. But I think it goes further. It can actually then transcend to the overall program. So whether it’s the retail and the food and beverage experiences, whether it’s the hospitality experiences that are in that mixed use equation, all of those can be looked at through these different lenses in a way that they become, you know, much more about plug-ins to cities that actually help better the context, not just the immediate block that they’re in.
AD: I can feel that when I’m in a building, I mean I’m sensitive to space anyway, I’m a designer and I think about space like that but when I’m a building and I can feel that I’m part of a working system, that feels better to me, not just a block of concrete that’s supposed to like sort of dominate nature and create boundaries, but a building that sort of works as part of a larger ecosystem. I know there’s a skyscraper that you designed that has a, instead of a spire, it has an inverted cone at the top to collect rainwater -
JG: Right, Shanghai Tower, yes, we did that, we did this tower in downtown Shanghai, right, in Pudong, which is like, it’s basically like the skyscraper garden of Shanghai and you’re right, it has an inverted cone at the top that harvests rainwater that’s used for irrigation of some of the interior gardens of the building. It also has wind turbines built into the top of the building as well that helps offset some of the power needs for the building. It’s actually like a vertical city.
I mean if you took multiple city blocks and kind of turned them from horizontal to vertical, that’s, you know, like a concept in Shanghai Tower. And similarly if we stay in China for a second, there’s a project I did with our teams in actually a similar moment, in a sense it was in the midst of the global economic crisis that began in ’08 and it’s for Duke University. And it was, it’s called Duke Kunshan University and it’s a new university outside of Shanghai and to your point that you just raised, it was a full campus built at once.
But it is totally a part of the ecosystem that’s around it. It actually is the first lead campus in China and it a true blending of east and west architectural languages and the site itself was farmland that had a really high water table and it’s in a part of the outskirts of Shanghai that has these traditional water towns. So there’s a town called like Zhouzhuang that is a water town, which is like a Venice of China.
And we realized is that to actually have this campus feel like it is part of this community and that it actually takes advantage of the site, it can’t be like a dense series of high rises, feeling like you’re in downtown Beijing or downtown Shanghai. It needs to be low rise, it needs to be of the earth, it needs to be human scale. It needs to use water to tell a story. So instead of the traditional kind of campus quad, where you have the big lawn and you have these buildings around it, we actually just literally let the water come up that was literally a meter below the ground and the entire campus main, kind of heart of the campus is stitched around this body of water.
And then there’s these bridges that cross it and create these wonderful places that people can learn outdoors or they can learn indoors and it promotes that idea that learning can happen anywhere. And it’s this series of buildings that feel like there’s a human scale to them and that it’s something that feels like it sits on this former farmland and not something that in a sense towers over it.
AD: Wow! That sounds magical, I’d like to go there [laughter].
JG: Well, I wish we both could go there right now for a visit, but you know, it is interesting, I did go back there in, last fall and just didn’t, you know, say anything about, you know, there was an architect on the project or whatever and I just walked around and talked to students. And we talked earlier about pride of place and there was such a pride of place and that people were just sitting around and appreciating the outdoors or the indoors or the relationship of the buildings to the outdoors. And you know, I walked away feeling really good.
We talked about creating projects that help communities and plug in. It felt that these students were really appreciating their surroundings and appreciating the moment in time for them, that was supported by the architecture.
AD: Yeah, I’m glad you brought that up because I think it’s one thing to sort of analyze what problems need to be solved and then design around solving those problems and then apply them. But you really, in order to know if that worked, in order to inform your future explorations and projects, you need to know what was successful or not successful about it. And you sometimes don’t know that for five or 10 years after the project is built.
JG: So true and being able to try to figure out the lifecycle is, I think, is a good point. I mean being able to revisit projects and go back through buildings and try playing our hand at being the users, not just the designers, there’s so much learning that can happen from that. It can inform adjustments to those projects, it can inform how we approach new projects.
AD: Yeah, okay, so I have kind of a question that’s on my mind a lot - buildings, and I mean even residences, smart homes and skyscrapers are getting more and more technologically advanced and there are some technological advancements that pose obvious benefits but also can be problematic. For instance, I can see a number of ways how facial recognition might be helpful in a large building system. But it’s also racist [laughs] and rife with potential problems. So are you ever haunted by the possibility that some idealistic technological implementation could turn sour?
JG: You raise a really challenging and interesting point to where we are with the, I would call it the, ascent of the prop tech world, the whole internet things now making its way into architecture. And it creates a very, you know, I think unique moment where architecture can be smart. We in many ways want it to be smart so that we’re able to learn how our buildings are performing, learn how our buildings are being used, learn how space is being appreciated or used and actually monitor it so that we’re not overusing energy, that we’re actually being conscious of how we can actually make things more efficient.
But at the same time, user access, being able to have biometric security to come into a building. You’re right, there are definitely the pros and cons of that and it raises the question of like, how much opt in should be brought into the equation. You know, I know for me, I went back to our office a couple of weeks ago just to pick up some things and recognizing the whole pandemic, I was thinking about how many surfaces I was touching to go from my car to into the building, you know, through the lobby up to the floors that we’re on.
And I’m like wow, you know, there are ways to do this touchless, right, and in this particular moment in time, I would be okay with being able to opt in such that I could have a touchless journey and many people may disagree with that. But I was thinking about how many times I had to apply Purell to my hands [laughs] and check my face mask and you know, put on gloves and I was thinking, if I didn’t have to touch anything, would that be a better journey? And in this particular case it would have been.
Is that gonna be true every day? Well, no, but for the moment it feels like there’s kind of a short term reaction to this, a mid-term and a long term. And for investments in tech it, the tech will certainly change, but the question is also what tech can be brought in that’s such that it’s the software that updates, you know, rather than having to go rip things out of the building and put new things in. Such that things can change, potentially even on a daily basis.
AD: Yeah, and it also means, what happens when the building becomes fix is that then society changes to adapt to the building and that’s what you don’t want. That’s the scenario you wanna avoid.
JG: And I wonder with the, the advent of so much digital experience in architecture, are we getting to a point, and we have a team that’s actually been exploring this with clients, the digital experience team, which is, you know, what happens when your architecture actually can be ever changing? So when your architecture, let’s say it’s your building facades, your building skins or components of buildings, that are done in a way with technology infused into them that they can actually change their appearance.
I know it feels like so far off but the technologies are there now. You know, actually the building could change as society changes, which totally transforms the equation.
AD: It’s scary too because there’s a level of like sort of ground shifting under your feet kind of thing. If the world around you is shape shifting and morphing, then it can be hard to get your bearings but if it’s sort of shape shifting in the way that a tree does, like a slow growth, that can respond to the environment in terms of leaning towards the sun and moving, being resilient and moving its branches in the wind, that makes sense to me.
JG: And I agree with you because I think that’s where it would get really interesting, where let’s say that there’s some shifts in climate, such that the building actually needs to morph a bit to actually work with the climate, that could be done in a way that actually makes it better for those that are using the building and better for those that are living around the building. That could be amazing and transformative but at the same time you know, if it’s technology that just is, I want the building to look blue today and green tomorrow, I’m not sure that does it.
AD: Right, right, well and there’s also, I always go back to the light switch because there’s something really trusty and reliable about reaching out to the same spot in every room to find that light switch and if the light switch isn’t there, and you don’t know which app you need to fiddle with [laughter] -
JG: Right.
AD: To put on the lights, [laughs] -
JG: Right, then you’re standing in darkness for hours [laughter].
AD: Yeah.
JG: Yeah, it’s interesting; we can do that now right. It’s like, you know, and the same thing is true with a door handle. I know where the door handle is, but what happens if you know, I don’t wanna touch the door handle, right?
AD: Right.
JG: I think it raises a really interesting, probably there’s like a set of levers that can be pulled in different ways to take projects one direction or another. I think there’s also another question that’s out there too, given all the discussions about resilience and sustainability, you know, do we need to build new? Can we think about how we can reuse what we have in society as bones for something different rather than just knocking it down and building new?
AD: Oh, I 100% believe in you know, using the bones for something, adapting the bones for something that we need. I feel really uncomfortable when all signs of history have been erased and it feels like, when everything is -
JG: Yeah, totally new, right, it’s like -
AD: I don’t feel comfortable at all. It does not give me a sense of any sort of depth of roots -
JG: I hear you.
AD: I don’t trust anything around me [laughs] I don’t know if corporate levers were in charge of this [laughs] -
JG: It feels so clean that you don’t know, like something just doesn’t feel right, right?
AD: I need history, and that’s one of the magical things about your trip to Rome, right, DC, while you know, chock full of monuments and symbolism that represent the American journey, it’s young compared to Rome and when you can go and experience that level of cultural depth I think you have much more of a connection to humanity than when everything is being sort of erased and rebuilt around you.
JG: I agree with you and we, living and growing up in DC, I remember there was a part of DC that I really didn’t know about anf DC is really a two river town, but I grew up thinking it was a one river town because I really didn’t understand about this other side of the city. And you know, through some opportunities, there was this site that used to be part of the navy yard that was making battleships during WWII, after WWII finished the navy kind of contracted back to a smaller footprint and it left this part of this city where again, didn’t know about it, but there came a time that there was an opportunity to think differently about the growth of neighborhoods in the city.
And this area, it’s called The Yards, it’s a new neighborhood in DC and it is, been written about a lot now, but it revitalized a waterfront, it brought attention to a part of town that definitely needed it. And it reused a lot of old buildings in a way that kind of gave new life to these old bones. And they’re amazing spaces and then certainly there’s sprinkling in of new buildings, but it’s that, like you said, it’s that rich tapestry now of old and new together, on the banks of a waterway that you know, people didn’t really understand and couldn’t appreciate.
And now it’s all kind of coming together in a way that says that what community can still, can happen here, it doesn’t all have to be new.
AD: Yes, and the High Line is a great example of that -
JG: Absolutely is, yeah.
AD: As well and I think the story of the High Line is so much richer and so much more important to the city knowing what it was to begin with.
JG: Right, and I agree with you and the beauty of the High Line also is that, now it’s this connective thread that feels like it was always a part of the city.
AD: Yeah.
JG: Like you can’t imagine the city without it.
AD: Right, okay, so I’ve got one last question that is important, we haven’t talked about you personally too much, but I know you’re a father of two daughters -
JG: I am.
AD: And I’m sure they have all the Legos they could dream of having [laughter] -
JG: They are amazing daughters. My older daughter does not want to be a designer, which is great; she wants to be an actress -
AD: Okay.
JG: So she’s going to Northwestern University in the fall, so very excited for her, proud of what she’s doing. And our younger daughter wants to be an interior designer, which I’m also really excited about, for different reasons, right?
AD: Yeah.
JG: But I guess I hope that they, when they’re through with their education, that they emerge in a world that truly appreciates all voices equally. So that whether it’s the two of them or others, that they can be equal parts contributor to society and that their voices are heard loud and clear, just like everybody else’s.
AD: Well, and it sounds like you’re doing your part to build a society that does allow for equal valuation of all voices.
JG: Well, thank you, we are certainly trying and you know, I think the nice thing about the environment that we’ve created at Gensler, it is an environment that appreciates all voices globally and recognizes that you know, we are truly trying to shape the future of our communities and our cities and that this moment in time that we’re all in, I think sorely points out the need for us to give attention to all, not just a few.
AD: Well put, thank you so much Jordan, thank you for sharing your story and your smarts and the nature of the work that you’re doing, this has been really fascinating.
JG: It’s been great talking with you, thanks for bringing me on and really looking forward to future dialogues.
AD: Thank you for listening! To see images of Jordan’s work and read the show notes, click the link in the details of this episode on your podcast app, or go to Cleverpodcast.com where you can also sign up for our newsletter. Subscribe to Clever on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you would please do us a favor and rate and review, it really does help us out. We also love chatting with you on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, you can find us at Clever Podcast and you can find me at Amy Devers. Clever is produced by 2VDE Media with editing by Rich Stroffolino, production assistance from Laura Jaramillo and music by El Ten Eleven. Clever is proudly distributed by Design Milk.
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Jordan Golstein
What is your earliest memory?
Legos. Lots of legos. I have early memories of sitting in the middle of a large pile of legos and trying to build “houses.” Clearly, as a toddler, these weren’t sophisticated designs but those moments definitely fostered a love of building and my initial desire to be an architect.
How do you feel about democratic design?
2020 has brought with it so many challenges: the global pandemic, economic distress, social inequalities and civic unrest. This is such a significant moment for design. There is such a need for inclusive design that solves for pain points in society--healing in communities, creating healthier environments, re-entering in the workplace, etc.
What’s the best advice that you’ve ever gotten?
“Don’t live life in the rear view mirror.” I often share this statement with my kids after they’ve experienced something negative and are dwelling on it. It’s a reminder to move on, not get stuck in the past and not live life with regret.
Jordan in his apartment in Rome
Jordan at Tori Gates during his studies in Japan
How do you record your ideas?
To capture ideas, I blend a bit of the digital and the analog together on a regular basis. I have a few sketchbooks going for daily notes and doodles. I also have a digital folder that I call “freewriting” and periodically will take stabs at creative writing. Some of these pieces turn into blogs and others stack up in the folder or end up in the digital circular file.
What’s your current favorite tool or material to work with?
I always seem to have at least one home improvement project going on, especially these days. The latest tool that has been handy has been a finish nail gun. I’ve been finding ways to use this tool even if it means taking things apart only to put them back together.
What book is on your nightstand? (alt: What’s the best book you’ve read this past year?)
I’m currently reading the book “Faster: How a Jewish Driver, an American Heiress, and a Legendary Car Beat Hitler’s Best.” I love reading books that capture moments in history when ordinary people came together to do extraordinary things. Prior to this book, I read a bunch of books on the early days of the US space programs and the herculean accomplishments that led to the Apollo moon landings. It was so inspirational to read about the nearly 400,000 people from the US and Canada who worked on the moon missions and who were united by a common goal: to land human beings on the moon and bring them safely home.
Why is authenticity in design important?
We have a saying at Gensler that we can’t be global without being local first. To be local, immersion in the communities is so important. It’s critical for us to understand the context, the needs of the people who live/work/play there, the culture and then layer in the learnings that we have from around the globe to develop authentic, purposeful design solutions.
I’m also a big believer that great design is about compelling storytelling-- using ingredients like light, materials, form and site as characters to weave a strong visual narrative. Good stories resonate. Great design is timeless and enduring.
Favorite restaurant in your city?
Equinox Restaurant in downtown DC: a beloved Washington dining destination since 1999 and one of the first to champion farm fresh to the table. Small, intimate and innovative dishes.
Bangkok Community Center Concept
What might we find on your desk right now?
These days my desk is our dining room table. Since so much of work these days is about digital connectivity, my desk (aka dining room table) is a tangle of wires, multiple computer screens, video conferencing lights and a large microphone. However, to keep it balanced, to my left is an electric guitar and to the right is a music stand for those moments between calls when I can play some tunes.
Who do you look up to and why?
Sidney Goldstein, my grandfather who passed away several years ago, is someone I have looked up to since I was younger. I’ve always respected how he overcame adversity early in his life and led his life with a forward focused-mindset. Orphaned at a relatively young age, he enlisted in the army, fought in Northern Africa, all the way through Italy and into Austria, liberating a concentration camp in the process. Returning from the war, he built a value-rich life filled with family and friends and lived each and every day to the fullest. His noble path through life is something I greatly admire. One of the definitions of “noble” is “having high moral principles and ideals.” With that in mind, I often think of my grandfather and try to “live a noble life” in everything I do.
What’s your favorite project that you’ve done and why?
A favorite project of mine is the Duke Kunshan University campus in Kunshan, China. Through the determination of the team, the clarity of the design vision and the , this campus became a reality against so many odds. The campus —the first LEED certified campus in China— comprises six buildings, totaling 750,000 sf on 40 acres, including academic and administrative buildings, a 200-bed dormitory, a 12-room faculty residence, a learning pavilion and a 200-room hotel. The blending together of landscape and architecture allows learning to happen everywhere on a pedestrian friendly campus that celebrates the human experience.
At a time when academic architecture in the U.S. often means adding buildings to an existing campus or expanding current structures, the opportunity to design and deliver the first full campus for a top tier American university in China was unique. One of the main challenges was to respect the spirit of Duke University’s established identity and its low-rise campus in Durham within this very different context in China. A key issue to overcome was how to lead and link a multi-continent team and solve for language, time difference and cultural issues across 8,000 miles and create a campus experience that would have enduring value.
Duke Kunshan University
Rappahannock Country House at Night
What are the last five songs you listened to?
“Lovely Day” by Bill Withers
“If You Love Somebody Set Them Free” by Sting
“All My Friends” by the Revivalists
“City of Angels” by the Rippingtons
“Once a Day” by Michael Franti & Spearhead
Where can our listeners find you on the web and on social media?
@jordanbengoldstein on instagram
Jordan goldstein on linkedin
Clever is produced by 2VDE Media. Thanks to Rich Stroffolino for editing this episode.
Music in this episode courtesy of El Ten Eleven—hear more on Bandcamp.
Shoutout to Jenny Rask for designing the Clever logo.
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