Hasta La Ideas

Designers need to participate in the development of AI or face having the future world designed without them, warns Airbnb co-founder Brian Chesky in this exclusive interview.

Speaking to Dezeen at the River Cafe in London, Chesky, who graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), warned that history may be repeating itself as designers fail to embrace the potential of artificial intelligence (AI).

Designers “came to digital very late” he recalled, predicting that if they are also late to embrace the changing world of AI “the world will be designed without them”.

“Designers gave away a lot of their power”

“My recollection in the 1990s is that a lot of the most prestigious design jobs weren’t in the internet, they weren’t web designers, they were print – people came to digital design very late,” Chesky told Dezeen.

“A consequence of the best designers not going to the internet or into web design till very late was that people designed a world without them,” he continued.

“I think designers gave away a lot of their power during the development of the internet by not participating.”

Chesky warned that if designers do not adapt to and adopt AI, then they will end up being “subordinate” to engineers, mirroring what happened on the internet where the majority of websites are created by “product managers” not designers.

“It’s gonna happen,” he said. “So either you can be part of the change, or the world can be designed without you and then you have to fit into that change. And you’re going to be a subordinate.”

AI is “unstoppable”

Online rental website Airbnb was founded by Chesky with Nathan Blecharczyk and Joe Gebbia in 2007. Since then it has grown to become the world’s largest short-term rental website, with 1.5 billion stays booked through the site. Currently there are seven million listings on the site in almost every country in the world.

Chesky believes that AI is set to have an impact on everyone and that companies need to consider what that impact will be.

“My lesson to everyone with AI is it might have a negative near-term effect on your business,” he said. “It might not, I don’t know. But unless you think it’s going to get uninvented, if you think there’s gonna be more AI in the future than now, then the genie is out of the bottle.”

“I’m not here to say it’s a good thing – I think it’s on balance good, but my opinion about whether it’s going to be good or bad, kind of irrelevant, because it’s unstoppable.”

“My general advice is to participate in it”

He believes that the inevitability of AI’s impact means that design graduates should embrace the emerging technology.

“I think AI can either displace a lot of creatives or it can empower a lot of creatives,” he said.

“As a RISD graduate running a tech company, I would implore creative people, journalists, writers, people that identify as technologists, RISD graduates, Royal College of Art graduates… if you think AI’s here to stay and you think it’s going to be more important – and how could you say none of that’s true – then my general advice is to participate in it.”

As well as benefiting those people’s careers, Chesky argues that designers and creatives becoming more involved with AI could lessen the negative potential impacts of the technology.

“By having large numbers of designers and creatives involved in the development of AI, and AI-centred products, the potential negative impacts of the technology could be reduced,” he said.

“The best chance is for the most creative people, the humanistic people [to be] in charge, participate in what appears to be an inevitable revolution,” he said.

“And that will probably also limit the downside of that revolution. Do we really want only some types of people participating in the future and design the future? Or do you want all these people, especially the creative community to participate?”

“Wary of fetishization of technology”

Chesky explained that Airbnb was slowly adopting AI as he believes that it can be used as a tool to rethink what the company is doing. However, he doesn’t want the company to jump on the AI bandwagon, and will only be adopting the technology where it can be useful to its customers.

“I think one of the best ways to keep your balance in the technology world is to keep moving, to be on the leading edge, and we will be with AI,” he said.

“But, I am also wary of fetishization of technology, so we have not done a lot and not rushed to ship out things just to be on the bandwagon. I only want to adopt technology that is useful and helpful to people.”

Following its rapid growth, Airbnb is currently in its “second-album problem” phase, said Chesky. He explained that the company is aiming to launch a second product in the near future with the aim of replicating the success of multi-time entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos.

“The sheer number of entrepreneurs that have one idea, they do one thing, it’s incredibly successful, but they struggle to do a second thing, is numerous,” he said.

“Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos – there’s a reason they’re so famous. Steve Jobs six, seven times; Jeff Bezos, with Amazon retail prime and AWS, Elon with his multitude of companies,” he continued. “I’m part of that next generation on.”

“There’s one more phase for Airbnb”

Chesky explained that he will dedicate his future time at Airbnb to reinventing the company with the launch of a new product or idea that will rival the original home-letting idea.

“There’s one more phase for Airbnb, it’s probably what I spend the rest of my time at Airbnb doing, which is reinventing ourselves like all the great companies have done.”

However, before this can happen, Airbnb needs to improve its core offering, explained Chesky. It has been trying to manage expectations amid a wave of new users on the platform following the pandemic.

“I want people to be in love with the Airbnb service so as to want new things from us,” he said. “And there is a lot of love for Airbnb, but if I’m being critical, there have been a lot of complaints, especially when we got really popular because of the pandemic.”

“A lot of new people tried us and those people have expectations,” he continued. “They want the uniqueness of Airbnb and the reliability of hotel and that’s hard to do in 100,000 cities.”

Airbnb to launch product that is “going to surprise you”

The company has been working on “perfecting” its service to build the basis for a new launch.

We’ve been really focused this last year on really perfecting our service,” he said. “Hopefully we will kind of turn the corner and people will say ‘wow, they really improved their service, it’s really great’. Is it perfect? No, probably never be perfect, but it’s really better than other platforms.”

Chesky was coy about the upcoming product release, but hinted that it would be a service based on people meeting and going to events together.

The product is set to be launched at an event that’s “going to surprise you” in a manner similar to Apple‘s much-anticipated, past product launches.

“I’m very interested in business ideas that go beyond booking your house on a short-term basis. And I think about like how with our assets we have today, we have this system of trust, we have identities, we have profiles, you’ve verified more than 100 million profiles, we have a two-sided reputation system,” he said.

“We knew about you, we learned about what you wanted in life and we get to kind of potentially match you to people and places experiences all over the world – that’s kind of the conceptual space that we’re playing.”

The photo is courtesy of Airbnb.

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Portholes and semi-circular motifs characterise this colourful renovation and extension of a Victorian terrace house in Hackney, London, by architecture studio Gundry & Ducker.

Gundry & Ducker drew on the palette of 1950s American kitchens when creating the rear extension and renovated basement in this London house.

The studio also added a plywood staircase leading to a modern loft space, while the ground and first floors were maintained in a classic Victorian style.

The refurbishment features contrasting light and dark spaces, materials of varying texture and warmth, and rooms of contrasting volumes.

Gundry & Drucker’s intention was to provide “a series of spaces with different characters within a single house,” studio co-founder Christian Ducker told Dezeen.

A semi-circular staircase in cherry-wood veneer links the Victorian spaces in the original house to the floor below, which features the new extension and houses a kitchen and dining area. The stairwell space was left intentionally dark, with a porthole window to view the room beyond.

The porthole window “was located low down so the client’s children could look through it,” Ducker said.

The low and dark basement room, converted from a cellar by the previous occupants, has benefited from a rear extension in the form of a new bay window, fitted with bright-coloured window frames.

Semi-circular motifs are echoed in the deeply-recessed rooflight designs, which the studio created to “celebrate light, rather than glass”.

“One of the biggest challenges of the project was to create a bright and welcoming space in a formerly dingy cellar, whilst avoiding the usual rectangular glass roofs and big sliding glass doors,” Ducker explained.

The clients, people involved in the theatre and film industries, asked Gundry & Ducker to “inject some character and drama” into the standard terraced house whilst preserving the remaining Victorian features.

The studio approached the brief by choosing a fresh palette of colours to create different characters for the different spaces.

“It’s always a pleasure when you have a client who is interested in colour. The colours chosen for the lower ground floor were pink and yellow, which were taken from a kitchen advert in a 1950s magazine,” Ducker said.

“The workshop space is a contrasting tutti-fruiti. The upper floor of the house is in a variety of shades of green ranging from dark green paintwork to light green timber stain this is intended to reflect its Victorian heritage.”

Bay windows were the dominant architectural expression of the existing building’s exterior and so the studio added another bay in a similar style, painted white, to unite the new additions.

New bathrooms were installed throughout the house, echoing the green tones used throughout the above-ground rooms.

Pastel colours reminiscent of 1950s American interiors were kept for the basement kitchen and contrast the bright blue window frames facing onto the rear.

The kitchen features bespoke candy-flecked terrazzo worktops.

Founded in 2007 by Tyeth Gundry and Christian Ducker, Gundry & Ducker has also designed a colourful bubble tea cafe in Soho and a by-the-slice pizza parlour in Dalston.

Other London house extensions recently featured on Dezeen include Pashenko Works’ corrugated metal and blockwork extension in Camberwell and ConForm’s all-marble extension to Victorian house in Hampstead.

Project credits:

Structural Engineer: Feres Ltd
Contractor: Nika Projects

The photography is by Jim Stephenson.

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British studio Moxon Architects has repurposed a small cluster of 19th-century farm buildings in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, into a guesthouse, glasshouse and private artist’s studio.

Built following the restoration of the owner’s main house in a hillside settlement in the Cairngorms National Park, the completion of the trio of buildings marks the end of a decade-long undertaking by the studio to reoccupy the site.

According to the studio, three material choices defined the design: expressed oak in the guesthouse interior, Douglas Fir timber for the glasshouse and frameless glazing inserted into apertures throughout existing wall structures.

“It is testament to the robustness and resilience of the historic buildings that this is a project characterised by retention and repair,” said Moxon Architects co-founder Ben Addy. “Where there are new interventions, they are modest yet highly crafted, and seek to emulate the craft, form, and rigour of the 170-year-old architectural fabric.”

The L-shaped guesthouse was rebuilt from a partially collapsed cattle shed as a detached extension of the client’s primary home.

A double-height living space and kitchen lie underneath an exposed hayloft roof structure, while the walls were finished with a textural clay plaster and oak joinery to disguise modern appliances.

The most ruinous building of the converted trio was the greenhouse. Remnant stone walls became a backdrop for a glazed extension which was framed with structural timber and a steel portal enclosure.

“The glasshouse does not follow a vernacular pattern, it is a new form, but it carries the same spirit [as the original building]… undertaken with great care and precision in the detail,” said Addy.

To the northern edge of the glasshouse lies the artist’s studio, which contains a private workshop, kitchen, wet room and storage for the designer client.

Interior walls were lined with maritime pine and contrasted against a rough steel block insertion coated with phosphate and beeswax.

For both external works and internal detailing, Moxon Architects prioritised using and reusing materials sourced from across the site.

“Where the masonry has been rebuilt the stone has again come from the site itself – zero material miles,” explained Addy. “Similarly, wind-blown cherry and ash from the garden has been turned to form door handles and other joinery details.”

By referencing the robust material choices of the region, Moxon Architects sought to create a sense of longevity and resilience.

“Durability, in all senses, was important,” said Addy. “We developed the design and details to ensure that these once derelict buildings will survive for the next two hundred years.”

“Most of all, it is about continuity in the ‘art of building’ embodied by the existing buildings,” Addy continued.

“For what are ostensibly humble vernacular structures, the precision of the original construction is remarkable… and it was important that the new parts brought forward the same sensibilities.”

Founded in 2004, Moxon Architects has offices out of both London and Aberdeenshire. In 2022, the studio was awarded RIAS‘ Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award for their Quarry Studios project.

The photography is by Simon Kennedy.

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Indian architecture studio Workers of Art (WOA) has converted a former storage space into its own plant-filled office, using recycled and repurposed waste materials in almost every aspect of its design.

Called WOA Second Home, the office is located in Kochi, Kerala, and occupies a 1,450-square-foot (135-square-metre) concrete structure that was previously used for storing tiles.

Aiming to “underscore the necessity of the curtailment of waste output in architecture,” WOA made use of materials that had been “relegated to landfill” including concrete board, PVC pipes and acrylic sheets, to create a workspace that would reflect the studio’s ethos.

“The design celebrates the value of materials that might have otherwise been discarded, creatively forming patterns and combining different elements to breathe new life into the space,” said the studio.

“For instance, odd-shaped waste tiles are harmoniously mixed and matched, finding their new home in the powder room. A strikingly repurposed tile piece also elevates the entry steps, underscoring the studio’s attention to detail and innovative flair,” it added.

Organised across one floor, the entrance to the office leads into a large space lined with a zig-zag of ferrocement desks along the eastern wall, next to a meeting table and sample board at the centre of the room and a more private workspace to the west.

A new partition with a large arched opening and blackout curtain leads through to a breakout area and facilities space containing a locker area, kitchen and bathroom.

“The design of the workstations, which meander through the shared workspace, was strategically planned to encourage teamwork while also allowing for individual space,” WOA co-founder Priya Rose told Dezeen.

“The philosophy was to create a workspace that feels like a ‘second home’ – evident in the thoughtful design elements that prioritise comfort, aesthetic pleasure, and a sense of belonging,” she added.

Custom black light fittings on the ceiling were created by repurposing lengths of PVC pipe, while bespoke planters were made using ferrocement lined with blue plastic barrels.

The existing tile floor in the building was retained, with areas that had become cracked removed and infilled with microcement to create contrasting dark grey geometric areas.

Throughout the studio, discarded antiques and over 100 species of local plants were introduced to bring a “homely” quality to the space.

WOA Second Home has been shortlisted in the workplace interior (small) category of Dezeen Awards 2023.

In Madrid, designer Lucas Muñoz used upcycled junk and construction waste to create nearly every interior element of the Mo de Movimiento restaurant.

The photography is by Ishita Sitwala. 

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London studio Pearson Lloyd has teamed up with furniture brand Profim to create a workplace seating system that is both reconfigurable and recyclable.

Revo is a system of upholstered sofas, benches and stools that attach to matching partition screens.

As the first collaboration between Pearson Lloyd and Flokk-owned Profim, the collection launched in 2022 and is now shortlisted for Dezeen Awards 2023 in the workplace design category.

The modular system was designed with the circular economy in mind.

Its softly contoured seats can be combined in 96 different ways, to suit a wide variety of workspace tasks, and can be easily reconfigured as needs change.

While most upholstered furniture is notoriously hard to recycle, the Revo range was produced using primarily recycled materials and is 74 per cent recyclable, according to the designers.

It has a lightweight frame made from recycled expanded polypropylene (REPP), rather than the typical plywood, while its upholstery is held in place with a tethered drawstring instead of glue or staples.

“Revo represents a radical rethinking of the way upholstered contract furniture is made in response to the climate crisis,” said Luke Pearson, co-founder of Pearson Lloyd.

“Replacing the plywood base structure with REPP maximises the potential reuse of the base materials,” he explained.

“Plywood has no circularity. REPP, which is already in its second life, can be fully remoulded for a third, a fourth, ad infinitum.”

Revo designs were characterised by a geometry that combines straight edges with curved corners, based on the concept of “squaring the circle”.

This adds to their versatility, allowing different elements to be arranged in parallel or at right angles to suit both individual focus work and different group setups.

Customers can choose from two upholstery textiles. Cura, by German fabric company Gabriel, is a two-colour fabric made from 98 per cent recycled polyester, while the more textured Oceanic, by fabric brand Camera, is made from 100 per cent recycled polyester.

These textiles were selected for their durability, but could be easily changed in the future, according to Pearson Lloyd.

“In Revo’s ease of reupholstering, we are looking ahead to a time when furniture is leased and not purchased, when the ability to refresh, refurbish and renew furniture will be increasingly important, especially in the contract market,” said Pearson Lloyd co-founder, Tom Lloyd.

The colour palette, devised by Profim creative director Maja Ganszyniec, makes it possible to create striking colour contrasts or more nuanced tonal palettes.

The collection is completed by a series of tables in different sizes and heights.

Revo is one of several recent Pearson Lloyd projects that explore more eco-friendly approaches to furniture. Others include the Gen Z-focused CoLab classroom furniture and the easy-to-repair Cross chair.

Meanwhile, other products in Profim’s range include the ergonomic AccisPro office chair.

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