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Your projects might be exceptional, but if your studio looks and sounds like everyone else, the market won’t always give you the chance to prove it. We’re joined by Emily Konwiak Stevens of Emily Stevens Studio, an architecture brand designer and strategist, to talk about what branding really means for architects, interior designers, and other design-led businesses, especially in a competitive New Zealand and Australian landscape where the DIY instinct runs deep.

We get practical about brand strategy: the workshop questions that uncover what matters, the competitor and ideal client research that sharpens positioning, and how a genuine point of difference often comes from a mix of niche, approach, access, and place rather than trendy buzzwords. Emily also unpacks why rebranding can feel scary and personal, and why the goal isn’t to invent a persona, it’s to close the communication gap so your online presence, website, visuals, and tone of voice reflect the quality you deliver.

We also challenge a few industry habits: why PR, publications, and awards programmes are often image boosters instead of lead engines, how simple marketing consistency builds confidence over time, and what “personal brand” can look like for architects without the influencer vibe. If you’ve ever worried that promoting your practice feels smarmy, this conversation reframes branding as honesty, clarity, and craft. If it helps, subscribe, share it with a studio mate, and leave a review with the biggest branding question you’re still trying to answer.

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Follow us on @designpriciplespod on Instagram and if you wish to contact us hit our DMs or our personal pages. We love to hear from you it really encourages us to keep going and the ideas and feedback we get from the listeners is awesome!

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A pile of treated timber offcuts looks harmless until you ask the awkward question: where does it actually go, and what does it do once it gets there? We get interviewed by Toby, a University of Otago Master’s student researching timber circularity, and we go straight at the uncomfortable parts of New Zealand construction. We talk about how NZS 3604 and stick framing shape almost everything we build, and how a quiet “fear of liability” can lead to over-spec framing, more thermal bridging, and far more timber waste than we think.

From there we zoom out to the landfill reality, including why timber is such a problem material for sites like Victoria Flats in Queenstown Lakes District: it’s bulky, it doesn’t compact, it clogs machinery, and a huge portion is treated. We dig into the knowledge gaps around treated timber, including CCA-treated timber, and why perception, evidence, and education matter when you start talking about reuse, chipping, furnaces, or any other recovery pathway.

We also keep it practical. We share design moves that reduce timber without compromising performance, the promise of prefabrication and off-site manufacture, and why SIPs (structurally insulated panels) can dramatically cut timber in external walls. We touch on HomeStar and Green Star, embodied carbon measurement, material passports, and designing for disassembly so buildings become material banks rather than future waste.

If you care about sustainable building, timber recycling, and a real circular economy in Aotearoa, you’ll get plenty to argue with and plenty to act on. Subscribe, share this with someone in the industry, and leave a review, then tell us: what’s the first timber change you’d make?

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Follow us on @designpriciplespod on Instagram and if you wish to contact us hit our DMs or our personal pages. We love to hear from you it really encourages us to keep going and the ideas and feedback we get from the listeners is awesome!

Send us Fan Mail

Year-end is when the honest stuff bubbles up: what we built, what broke, and what we’ll try differently next time. We raise a glass to the community that’s carried this show and jump straight into the craft and chaos of design life—part celebration, part hard-won field notes.

We start with the real costs and protections behind small studios: trusts, liability, and why construction firms fold faster than architects who keep overheads lean. From there, the stories turn tactile. A shaky three-storey demo becomes a lesson in salvage economics, where windows and steel pay the bills. Then comes the headline experiment: hydroforming a stainless-steel sauna for a client with six tonnes of water. We break down triple welds, reinforcement, polishing, spray foam to shift the dew point, and smart vent placement so the hottest air stays breathable. It’s a blueprint for making odd ideas safe, efficient, and beautiful.

That hands-on build sparks a bigger provocation: what if cladding and structure are the same thing? We connect hydroforming to arches, keystones, and tensioned timber, arguing for performance-led form over decoration. Along the way we tackle the eternal software debate—Revit, Archicad, and the surprising power of simple stacks like Google Forms and Sheets for time, variations, and site workflows. We make the case for physical models that carry the concept from week two to the final pour, and for digital twins that guide renovations, farm fencing plans, and long-term maintenance without drowning in subscriptions.

If you’re hungry for design that survives contact with the real world—pricing, risk, salvage, systems—and still leaves room for bold form, this one’s for you. Subscribe, share with a friend who loves building as much as drawing, and drop us a note with the one tool or habit that saved your studio this year.

Please Like and Subscribe it really helps :)

Follow us on @designpriciplespod on Instagram and if you wish to contact us hit our DMs or our personal pages. We love to hear from you it really encourages us to keep going and the ideas and feedback we get from the listeners is awesome!