From Concept to Sensation: Crafting the Future of Experiential Hospitality

From Concept to Sensation_ Crafting the Future of Experiential Hospitality
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Stephen Drew: Hello everyone. I can't wait for this. Imagine you're in this beautiful hotel lounge, you're in this bar, you're in this cool bougie place. This is past the pandemic. We want to go to all the cool places and let's find out who designs those. In 20 seconds. All right. I'm excited for this one.

Hello everyone and welcome to this live stream special. I am super excited you're here. Like I said, imagine you're in that pool, you're going to that place. Your partner's invited you [00:01:00] out for a very fancy dinner, a restaurant, you're going to that hotel you always wanted to be. You always wanted to go in the pandemic.

Now, who designs those spaces and what is the future of hospitality? And what do we mean by hospitality? Is it a hotel? Is it a bar? Is it an immersive or sensory experience? What is experiential hospitality? I'm going to find out. You're going to, we're going to learn together. A little bit of evening learning, or if you're watching the replay, it can be, I don't know, with a morning learning.

Whatever you want it to be. And on that note, I have a fantastic guest who has made time to join us here from their busy schedule. It is Anna Moysen from Anna Moy Studios. Anna, how are you?

Ana Moisin: Hi, Steve. Thank you for such an amazing intro. This was the best intro.

Stephen Drew: I'm excited. And listen, the pleasure is all mine because I love what you do. However, I gotta not get ahead of myself because while I know you, Some people might [00:02:00] not know you. So first of all, before we talk about your business, tell us who you are in your own words.

Ana Moisin: Hi. Nice to meet you all. Hello. I'm Anna Moysin and I'm the Creative Director and Founder of Anamo Design Studio. But with Anna as this is the design podcast I've been a Hospitality Interior Designer for the past I'm looking at the calendar, watching. 12, 13 years.

Stephen Drew: Wow.

Ana Moisin: I've been after graduating, I've been working in interior design ever since.

So I've started with a bit of retail and then merged into hospitality. And now, of course, we're doing hospitality on steroids, let's call it.

Stephen Drew: I love it. I love it. While you're here, and I know we're going to talk a bit about the company, but I'm going to quickly bring up the link of some of the projects that you do. Now, I've got one or two that I really like. There's one in Birmingham that I really want to go to. And it was a shame that when I was in Birmingham, it wasn't being built yet, but it's on my list.

But [00:03:00] first of all, for anyone that might be confused with that term, what do we mean by hospitality? First of all, Anna, what is hospitality, architectural or interior design?

Ana Moisin: Hospitality, interior and architecture is, of course the, Businesses and the fields are very linked together, or this is what we feel in the studio anyway. We mean everything from food and beverages, so restaurants, bars nightclubs it could span all the way to hotels and of course leisure parks and, huge resorts.

Hospitality is pretty much everything that is guest facing and offers this sort of food and beverage and dining and such. It's very much guest focused not unlike retail. Of course, you have retail, which is guest focused, but this is more yeah, the design is everything guest focused, hospitality wise.

Stephen Drew: I love it. Okay, cool. So while I'm excited about the projects as well, you mentioned you do a lot of interior design, which is fantastic. Some of our listeners could be from an architectural background, some hopefully from an interior background as [00:04:00] well, but I'd love to know as well. So in terms of what you do on a typical hospitality project, can you give us a flavor of the kind of things you'll be involved in?

Ana Moisin: Yeah, absolutely, we can span we are working close to the RIBA stages as interior designers as well, but we really love taking projects all the way from the early feasibility stages, all the way to completion, so that, that's great. Of course, it spans from feasibility it goes into the initial pitch presentation, a bit of an abstract concept, then into concept design development, and then we'll take it into technical design.

We love Doing that stage as well. Of course, you have all the FFA associated to it, all the specifications, all the scheduling. And then it goes, finally the product goes on site. So we do quite a lot of site monitoring as well, all the way to handover and post handover. So what I was saying We try in all of our projects and the ones that we will definitely be speaking about [00:05:00] today, we are trying to go through all the stages because I think the knowledge transfers very well.

Yeah, we definitely love to be involved in all, but we can also be involved just in some.

Stephen Drew: I love it and love it. And yes we are, we'll go into the work in just a second, but as well, so do you collaborate a lot with the architects on these kinds of projects? Then Anna, like what's the role of the interior designer versus the architect or how do they work together in your experience?

Ana Moisin: I think we've established some great collaborations. Of course we have now architects in-house. But what we've how we've been working on before we we've established some great partnerships with architecture studios and we do, let's say everything from an interior design perspective, but we will always get involved in structure and, structural, elemental, space planning, and they will then be taking taking our design and, of course, looking at regs, making sure, doing all the fire strategy and building control analysis, working with [00:06:00] the acquisitions.

M& E M& E Consultants, Lighting Designers. So we will be, of course, be coordinating on our side, but the Architect will have an overarching coordination, which is which is really helpful on some of our largest projects. Sometimes we can do this in house for probably small projects, and now we will do it in house.

Maybe we will be able to do this in house a lot more as our studio grows, but yeah, we love working with architects. We are collaborating very well.

Stephen Drew: I love it when I was in architecture many years ago, one of the packages that I was involved with was working with the interior designer, doing all the F and E cupboards of high end residential, but I didn't do them all correctly, Anna, so it's just as well. I'm here now, but I love that collaboration.

And I think that, an architect working with an interior designer, when it when the synergy is going, it is fantastic. Now you mentioned you have architecture in house as well, which is amazing. Probably it's a good time if I [00:07:00] bring up the presentation that we can go through it a little bit.

Now, Anna's first time on the Architecture Social podcast. So clearly she's got a lot of trust in me, which could be misplaced because I might drive this. This slideshow rocks, but Anna, you've got to, you've got to guide me through it as you would with any member of your team. And don't be shy if I stick on a page for a while.

So we've got the beautiful front page, which looks amazing. It's got your project and you're going to tell us all about that, but I'll skip ahead on this one. This is yourself and gives the overview. Shall I scoot on a little bit or?

Ana Moisin: Sure.

Stephen Drew: I love what you do and yeah, but you give a good overview on that.

Let's just jump in now. Come on, you got to tell me about this project. This is super cool.

Ana Moisin: This is indeed cool. This is our latest completed project. This is in Birmingham, UK. So it's the F1 Arcade Birmingham. It's the second Formula One F1 Arcade site after the London opening. It's [00:08:00] really amazing. Look at that. We hung an F1 car from the ceiling and it's a real size one.

It's not smaller. You and everybody else in the podcast should go and check it out. It's it's a really special space. Yeah it's really beautiful.

Stephen Drew: It's amazing. It looks super cool. That definitely won't fall down the internet. Did you and the structural guys, you spent a lot of time. Did you

Ana Moisin: on us. Yeah,

Stephen Drew: we're going to put the car on the ceiling. And they were like, what are you crazy?

Ana Moisin: that was that was the initial stages. But then we had, yeah, we had a really good team from structural engineers, as I mentioned, to, to architects and construction manager. So they managed to, do this seamlessly. And we had just a day before opening. So it went up in less than 12 hours from, so that was that was definitely a big challenge at the end of the project, but it's it was well worth it.

Stephen Drew: I love it. And so for our audio listeners, there is this amazing bong. Beautiful bar. It's amazing. You should check out the video, but yes, it's a [00:09:00] formula car strap. It's a formula one car strapped to the ceiling. So absolutely amazing. I'm trying to be a bit more inclusive. And sometimes what I do is I go, I talk about it, our audio listeners, you should check out the video as well.

I'll go on to the next slide. So this is a bit more, there's different aspects of it as well. It, I, it. It, that's what I was going to say. To me, it feels very rich. It feels very well considered. Do you want to jump into some of the things you thought when approaching this brief that you would do in these kind of scenarios?

Ana Moisin: Yes, so absolutely, I think with F1 Arcade Birmingham, we designed the F1 Arcade in London, which is the flagship venue that opened a year before Birmingham. So in Birmingham, I think the design challenge and the design beauty was to take the good work that was done in London and take it up to the next level.

So people that have seen both would understand that the Birmingham design is a little bit more [00:10:00] modern. Some of the sort of more let's say it's not traditional, but slightly less modern elements were rationalized in this design. We have on the first photo of the top left hand side, we have the Onyx backlit panel.

Everything in Birmingham we focused a lot more on lighting and how we design with light. We design with light quite a lot, so light is never an afterthought of our design. Everything, all the pieces that you see in this presentation, they act as almost like a, the bar acts like a super big wall light.

Although it's a beautiful piece in its own right and it, of course, serves a purpose and everything has been designed to the client's brief, but it just gives this wonderful glow that, of course, throughout the day, the light intensity changes. The feeling that you get from it, I think that's what we are trying to achieve.

Always for the guests to, remember the warmth and the experience that they [00:11:00] felt into the space without necessarily pinpointing to one element. But in the collection of photos, you can see the reception area with a wonderful bespoke floor there. You can, in most of these photos, at least the two bottom ones, you can see we've designed some bespoke circuit inspired chandeliers.

They're not The real circuits, but they're definitely inspired by them. And we've taken a different approach than in London. Again, a little bit more modern and a little bit more tailored to youthful and tailored to the Birmingham customers and audience.

Stephen Drew: I love it. I had a quick question on that. You mentioned the importance of getting that lighting right. Does that involve a lot of experimentation then, Anna? To work it out, what's too bright, what doesn't work? And to create that experience, are you there finessing, working out the balance and stuff like that?

Ana Moisin: Yes, absolutely. It takes a lot of trial and error, but of course we collaborate with some top [00:12:00] lighting designers around the world. And they would always help us, guide us with our decisions. So we could try to create a concept, maybe it has too little lighting, or maybe the, one feature almost cancels the other.

So we want to have this perfect balance of, radiating indirect light combined with forward facing light, combined with these wonderful glows and everything else that happens from an architect, Architectural Lighting Perspective but yeah, definitely a lot of trial and error, and it's a really fun exercise.

I remember we even have it in the studio. We have the light sheet, the ONIX sample, so we, we were testing out how far away it needs to be from the light sheet, and all these little little details. We love doing that, and I think we are a bit obsessed with the details when it comes to design.

Yeah, I think that, that's what makes a project really good, this obsession to detail.

Stephen Drew: Fair enough. Fair enough. It definitely looks well considered. I'll keep clicking on because it's a beautiful slideshow, but also, Anna, don't be too polite because I [00:13:00] will stay on the page forever because it looks so good. So I'm just going to move on. Here's a, here's it in full force then, right? You can see the light in here.

Now, can I ask how with hospitality? Now, some of the guests here, I'd imagine will be very well considered. Some might, I've had a few drinks or some might be, maybe not as so what I'm saying is there might be some rough and tumble with these kinds of things. Do you have to think about like that? The you, the space being used, do you have to think about how it will survive with the very eloquent guests, but also the sometimes inebriated or clumsy guests as well?

Ana Moisin: Absolutely. That was that was definitely a consideration for the London venue. Not that it was not for the Birmingham venue but in the London venue, we had we weren't expecting the amount of high tech. footfall and, slightly more excited guests, let's say in times of the evenings.

And yeah, absolutely. So all the finishes were selected for their robustness [00:14:00] and their longevity. So we didn't want to, Install, let's say, a table or a bar top to finish one day and then in a month's time it would be beaten down and we would have to replace it. So we definitely take this into consideration.

And I think in hospitality, more so than in other more so than in other design fields, I would say that this is quite important, the actual specification of the materials. But yeah, you can see, so in between these two slides, you can see a little bit of a glimpse of London. For Arcade, it's much larger than Birmingham,

Stephen Drew: Oh, yeah.

Ana Moisin: and it has, it has a PDR bar, so you can see there on the bottom right hand corner.

But everything, if you were to close your eyes and look at these images as a collection, like slightly close your eyes you would see, I think the lighting is something that sort of comes to you. And that's, that was the thing that we set to achieve from day one.

Stephen Drew: I love it. I think it looks great. It seems here, because we got the beautiful quotes, that the client was happy with it as well. You [00:15:00] had to meet their standards then and there. What's it like doing that sometimes? You get the brief. How do you sometimes impart a bit of creativity, but also keep it within the guidelines?

You can't be too crazy. You've got to bring that client along the journey, right? How do you navigate that space?

Ana Moisin: I think we said it, we always we all, our clients, whether they're new or existing and returning clients, we always tell them that our schematic design, so the initial presentations, we want to throw everything out on the table. We are always happy to tweak. So sometimes we would go to lengths of presenting multiple options or multiple bar options.

This, this bar has so many variations to it before we go to this, this design, this final design. So I think we can then gauge their level because each client is different. Sometimes they, they feel, or they think they're, extremely doing well with color or working, they think that they have an appetite for color but then when, when you, we show something out there they might think that [00:16:00] actually, they would like the scheme to be toned down or so we gauge it by throwing everything out there right at the start and seeing where it lands and then we tailor our presentation from there.

So there is not really a magic rule, but I would always say. Go with what you believe it's best at the beginning and then you can always negotiate and work through the ideas with the clients. I think if the clients are kept on board that's probably really beautiful because they get really excited about design.

Who wouldn't get to, sometimes they do so many other meetings apart from design. So when the design meeting comes, it's probably the most exciting thing of the day. Yeah,

Stephen Drew: It makes complete sense. Now, a quick little interlude question, if I may as well, because this space is beautiful. It's enchanting. Now, I know health and safety, we have all these regulations and stuff, which kind of are in place to be important. However, how do you like incorporate, for instance, a fire safety escape sign and keep the space looking beautiful?

Because [00:17:00] sometimes, I know they've got to be there, but you've got that big, green, clumsy sign. Do you have to spend a lot of thought in that, Anna, so that the people can, safely be in the space, and it's up to regulation, but also keep the experience as well?

Ana Moisin: course. And, based on what happened in the past years over the world and in London, the fire safety regulations have been made quite stringent, which, we completely agree to and agree with. But we are always trying to challenge the architects or, the architects of record on these projects to come up with different solutions.

And we are thinking, I think that the fire exits are, dealt with and implemented right from the feasibility stage. So we always look at the views through the space and seeing how these exit signs could actually not blend in, because of course they need to stand out, but work well with the surrounding design.

Stephen Drew: Inky, I get what you mean. Inky, BIM, in place. Makes complete sense. Thank you. Because I always wondered, [00:18:00] About that years ago, I worked on a post office scheme and they had very stringent, this needs to be here, this needs to be there. And I learned the importance of signage, especially when it comes to that, and people exiting the building.

Now, when I was clicking through, I stumbled upon this picture. This is the problem when I drive the slideshows, guys. I'm really sorry. But it looks nice. The other project is really nice. This one's also really nice. They're very different. And it's quite cool to see that, at Animal Studio, you do different design styles.

Just briefly touching up on this because it feels very different. Can you tell me about the pattern bar?

Ana Moisin: Indeed, this was a concept we worked on quite early on when the studio was created. And it was a pitch presentation for, of course, a bar in Manchester Airport. Unfortunately it was not built, but we had a lot of fun working on this concept. For sure. We were looking at smoke and steam and how, how [00:19:00] Manchester's sort of history could be incorporated in something quite high end in this case, but yeah very different styles.

And that's probably what we, Love, that's what I love anyway, and I'm talking from the whole team, but I think that's what they love as well. Being in hospitality, I think it, it opens us up to quite a lot of briefs very different styles. And that's what we love to do. We would not want to do one thing over and over again.

And probably I would say that's the beauty of interior design as a business, or at least hospitality interior design.

Stephen Drew: makes complete sense because sometimes the Popped around of a house style. And I think some CDOs may have more strong of a house style than others, but in your words, then you think it's actually good to challenge yourself. It's good to do things a bit differently. If the opportunity grants it, then I know.

Ana Moisin: Absolutely. I think it's always good to keep your ideas fresh. For me that's the most important that's the beauty of design. I am, [00:20:00] I'm trying to keep away from a house style. Maybe, we will have a podcast in five years and you'll say, Oh, I can clearly see a house style. What is this all about?

But I think we are definitely trying to veer away from it and try to expand our knowledge. In terms of materiality and different structures everything from geometry to textures to create these very different, but equally stunning designs.

Stephen Drew: Very cool. I like it. I think it's great. I'm going to click on the next slide. Now we can have a little look as well. So it seems this, can we talk quickly about this? So sometimes I like mood boards, Pinterest. I, I love them. I've been there myself where, okay, I'm not an interior designer, but me and my partner, when we're dealing with the house.

We're getting the mood, we're getting the Pinterest and do all this stuff. Do you do a lot of that kind of thing? Is you still find mood boards at the start of a project really important to set the scene and the tone for this experiential design?

Ana Moisin: Absolutely, because the experiential [00:21:00] hospitality is quite new, and some of the concepts, some of the concepts, of course, have precedence so that photography is easier to find or explaining a new idea is easier. But for completely new clients, I think it's really tricky to express an idea without, before drawing it, before 3D ing it.

So we are always trying to find whether it's abstract imagery or an image that is as close as possible to what we want to create. Usually of course, Pinterest is great for lots of reasons, but I think it can be it can set you on a wrong path when you come to doing these new concepts.

But we use it almost for a gathering of images that then We try to express a different part of the design through them, but these are used early, very early days in our abstract concept presentations. And then we just move on into of course, 2D and 3D design. So then the images are almost parked [00:22:00] there just to set the look and feel rather than to pinpoint an exact design decision.

Stephen Drew: Makes complete sense. And I totally agree. However, if you speak to my partner, I think we'll both agree that Pinterest is the way officially. Yeah. And if you're watching and I've removed this from the version that. I show my partner.

Ana Moisin: But usually, I think In residential design and, I'm seeing this about Pinterest and then, most of our residential clients have their own Pinterest. And of course, I'll say, yeah, do share with us your Pinterest and we'll take it from there. So it definitely has a place in design. I just don't think we need to heavily rely on it.

Stephen Drew: I can't, I completely agree. However, Pinterest, if you ever sponsor this podcast, I will remove this and I will buy.

Ana Moisin: remove what you said.

Stephen Drew: I will get you Anna to design something that I do, but we will remove this. I joke around one quick one while we're here and move on, because I know we're going to go back to the amazing projects, [00:23:00] but what's interesting here as well, the kind of the feel of the project here.

You can see the colors, the theme. What's interesting is you've brought it into The menu, the play, the kind of the offering as well. And it's interesting that the built environment, the interior design, the feel, the aesthetic, the experiential part of it, it's bleeding into the other functions of the business as well.

In this case, a restaurant. Do you always try to do that, Anna, in your projects? You try to bring the feel, the color palette, the design, the interior design into the graphic design, into the function of the business?

Ana Moisin: Oh, absolutely. And that's when you know when a project really hit the mark. It's not just interior design or it's not just lighting design. It's not just branding. I think all of them have to come together for a beautiful integration. Otherwise I think clients might miss the mark or, some areas look really good, but then, Something else is not as great.

I think [00:24:00] all of them have to sing the same language and we will always get involved whether it's with advice or concept designs or mock ups as you can see on this page.

Stephen Drew: Yeah very cool. It's something I hadn't thought about, but when it was here, I wanted to ask because it makes sense, but it wouldn't almost be your initial thought and being briefed in interior design, but these things carry through, really interesting. I did click again clumsy presentation person here while we're talking, onto the next project as well.

So tell me about this. This is the PUD track, right?

Ana Moisin: Yes, this is a patch deck in Watford. This is a special project to us because it was our first completed project under the Anamo Design Studio name. So of course it will always Special place in our heart. It's again, this is again veering into the experiential hospitality that I know we'll talk more in a second [00:25:00] about.

But this one is just like a bit of a fun one. It has hints of fairground, but it's a, this one has a juxtaposition between the raw fun and a more sophisticated element. So you see these very vibrant colors, but then you see very sophisticated elements woven in and it works, it really works for them.

They have been quite successful, of course, in the UK and internationally in the States. So a very different, again, very different concept, very different brief than the other projects that we've discussed so far. A lot of color in here, so they were definitely not scared of color. Color was just everywhere in this project, so it's definitely fun to design.

Stephen Drew: I like that. And just on the topic of it as well, because we talked earlier about Maybe the house style, color themes, that kind of aspect. But in here, a bit like the F1, the butt track, there's the fun element and there's a time and a place for fun. And there's also a time and a place for maybe something a [00:26:00] bit more relaxed, a bit more of a different feel.

How do you start calibrating? Putting up the fun and down that stuff. Is it playing again with the light and the atmosphere, the music, the feel? Do you, how'd you go about that kind of aspect of creating fun? Like the putt track?

Ana Moisin: I think fun, definitely. Lighting is a big, a big element. And of course Patterns, colors, dialing up the colors definitely creates this sort of whimsical atmosphere almost that Patchak has. But it's, it also has a raw nature of it and you can see it in the image on the top right hand corner where you have quite a lot of concrete elements and brick elements that come into it.

So it's quite a, I think, a nice mix, but I think you can make. Any project, probably you can always dial it up and, dial it down throughout the day, whether you know you want sometimes we've done projects where in the daytime it looks, of course very daytimey and inviting like a normal

Stephen Drew: Yeah. Yeah.

Ana Moisin: at night it just changes [00:27:00] completely and usually Lighting and a quick sort of space plan.

Reshuffle in key areas would make that a lot more, for example, for, from a restaurant to a lot more bar or a nightclub scene. But yeah, lighting, switching, things, lights on that the guests will never see during the day. That adds to the element of fun for sure.

Stephen Drew: I love it. Quick mini question here, because you've got these amazing pitchers, audio listeners, putt tracks, got these loop de loops and all this crazy stuff as well. Anna, did you play the course on putt track?

Ana Moisin: I was better at some, I was better, but I'm not, I haven't played for some time now. Sometimes I'm really good at it, and sometimes I'm terrible at it. Although, you played the same holes the same 18 holes. Yeah, it's it's always fun to be in there. Their scoring system is really high tech, so we try to put into the design. Yeah

Stephen Drew: I I didn't know that because, normally there's that argument about I got it in free and then someone's no, you [00:28:00] definitely didn't. But wow. Okay.

Ana Moisin: So Patrick at Patrick the golf ball recognizes you as the user.

Stephen Drew: what.

Ana Moisin: you can't say that you've hit it in three, if it's six. So unfortunately, that's where the fun ends , for the not so experienced, which I mean part of that category. But it's definitely, I think a great activity for large groups.

Stephen Drew: Putt Shack, you sound like a perfect place for the Architecture Social, don't kick us out because we got you on the episode, but no, it actually, it looks really fun, very cool to get the technical, the interior design down as well, and it sounds like from the quote here, That Angela at Putchak was very happy.

So fantastic. I'm going to scroll on now. Now this is a bit different. This is not Putchak on this slide. This is a totally different atmosphere. This is a totally different style of work. It's Putchak's office. So that's what they've got to do. Put the golf clubs away and do the stuff. So that makes, so that's interesting.

So while you did the [00:29:00] actual Putchak. It's not the hospitality, the space. You have to do their offices as well. How different is that?

Ana Moisin: It's night and day, of course, because this is an office environment, so everything had to be dialed down

Stephen Drew: Calm down. No crazy lighting from the stage.

Ana Moisin: Exactly. We still kept a bit of crazy lighting and some really fun elements dotted around the space. Because people that work at Pacek, of course, they, they have the vibe of their company is, they are of course fun. Otherwise, probably they wouldn't be working there. So I think these little fun elements and glimpses were dotted around the office just to, you just to make it a bit more of an interesting space and, just oh yeah, that's a cool detail.

We've yeah, we've worked on them on this and I've, I think I've added this to the presentation just to give you a feel because this is office design and it's not, it's not a massive office, of course, it was tailored for, I think, 50, [00:30:00] 60 people, so it's quite a small scale office, but it gives you the realm of what we do from these massive experiential hospitality venues.

Right down to, it could be a small office or high end residences.

Stephen Drew: I love it. There's a, it's important, isn't it? We need to work somewhere and actually it's changing at the moment, isn't it? Whereas in the pandemic, we went from always working in the office to now some flexible arrangement and also now people wanted to go back to work as well. So it's very, I'm very happy to see that in as well.

And here we go. We've survived the slideshow. Be honest, apart from the one or two things, how did I do? Was I okay?

Ana Moisin: I think you did very well.

Stephen Drew: I think I'm like Part 1 or Entry Level Interior Designer on my presentation skills.

Ana Moisin: I think so. I

Stephen Drew: I we got there in the end but listen, thank you so much for showing that I really think it helps as well to be visual when we're looking at this stuff, especially interior design, because the spaces are [00:31:00] beautiful, but if we zoom out for a second as well, because you're working in this space as well, and I touched upon the pandemic there, I touched upon working from home, now people are going back in.

However, hospitality as well. This feels like one of the areas that really struggled during the pandemic. It was all in the news about these bars struggling, some went out of business, some are now doing well as well. What's it been like in the last few years and in the hospitality scene? Are you seeing now more people looking to do these amazing new projects?

Do you feel that hospitality is coming back?

Ana Moisin: Yeah, absolutely. And it was so sad to see to see some amazing bars shutting down in the pandemic. It's definitely sad to see this. There were amazing concepts that, lost quite a lot of business. But I think coming out of it, there was definitely a breath of fresh air.

Fresh air with a lot of new concepts coming to the market we've seen a lot more interest in this experiential hospitality that we, we [00:32:00] work in as one of our fields. There, and I think guests are now trying to, go to the next thing. They're very curious about what's opening.

So sometimes, of course, you have these beautiful bars in, in, in London or in the big cities, but these Experiential venues that offer you just something else something fun to do. I think we see this more and more with the new generations because they're not so focused on just food and beverage, right?

They want the whole experience and the whole package. So we've definitely seen an increase in demand there after the pandemic.

Stephen Drew: Very good. Very good. I'm happy. And I love these spaces as well. And so do you think in response to that resurgence as well, do you think like these hospitality companies have had to readdress what it means and up the ante to get people to come back in the spaces as well?

Ana Moisin: I absolutely think so. So some of them, I think now we are definitely not in the market where You know, Medium. [00:33:00] Whatever the concept is, it has to be to the best of the brand or, to the best of what the brand has to offer, because there are so many good designs out there. All the people, even you and me we'll choose the best design.

based on more now than just the menu, right? You will choose to go to venues because of the stuff, the ambience. Of course, design forms part of that a lot, but it's the bigger package rather than just, going somewhere to have a drink. And I think a lot of brands are seeing that and definitely upping the ante because otherwise somebody else will come in and just Take the customers away.

Stephen Drew: Makes complete sense. I think it's really cool and it's a really interesting space. I'm just going to touch briefly again, on, on the actual studio as well. So can you just shed a tiny bit of light into how the business is constructed at the moment, how your design studio works, it can't be just yourself because it's just so much to do these projects.

Tell me a little bit about [00:34:00] the setup and your team and what Animo Studio looks like.

Ana Moisin: Yeah, absolutely. It cannot be one person and I think probably you're not told that. It's hard to believe maybe when you're in university and do everything on your own. This is absolutely not a business where you're on your own and shouldn't be. Because creative ideas come from a mix of a variety of different people.

people and different with different backgrounds as well. We have a great team. We've built a great team of course, multidisciplinary designers. From, we have architectures, architecture, interior design we have branding and marketing now in house. We are a studio of six. So it seems it's definitely, you can be involved in absolutely all the aspects.

But yeah we try to keep it fun and creative and yeah, that, that's how we've set up for growth for the future. I def, I believe in this multidisciplinary approach more than anything because it's really key. So somebody will [00:35:00] see something that somebody else doesn't and by collaborating we get to these amazing results that you see on the screen.

Stephen Drew: Yeah, it looks really cool and I'm quite impressed. Now this means as well as a designer, you're still involved in projects, you've got a team, but you're also, in the nature of this conversation, you're an employer. And where I mean by that is, you have to make the decision who joins and who doesn't.

Animo Studio and looking for that right person all the time. What, is there any advice for the audience? Cause it might be some people at the junior and mid of their career in interior design. Is there anything you look for in particular when you get CVs and portfolios or you go for interviews that sticks out as the kind of thing that you think would fit in?

Are there any tips in that area?

Ana Moisin: Yeah, I think definitely quite a lot of tips. I think. People don't probably realize how little, and this is, probably some people might not say that, but I think employers are, have a, a limited time frame to scroll through all these applications. So something has to [00:36:00] stand out. We've seen portfolios in the past that were only focused on, a completed application.

Project photos, but that doesn't show a breadth of experience of what, or what they can do, what skills they have whether it's concept or technical or, FF& E procurement, or whether they just love to sketch, whatever it may be. I think the best portfolio that we've seen and, People that we are asking to come for interviews are people that showcase in their portfolios quite a range of their skills and things that they have done themselves because, CGI and all these project images that you've put on the screen are great and that's the end result.

But the greatness comes from everything that happens before the end photo and how Everything in the presentation actually leads us to this end result. That's really what we're looking for when we just review CVs and portfolios. Of course, if it's a tailored job advert, so if, if we're looking for a senior [00:37:00] position, for example, and a really good junior applies, We just, it's not, the fact that they are not great, they might be the best junior designer ever, but the studio, especially, we are quite a small studio, larger studios might have a bit of a different approach, but I think small to medium studios, if they have a requirement for a specific designer, it's sometimes quite hard to, make space for somebody else that could fit quite well, but usually we just keep in touch with the applicants for later openings if we feel somebody is really good and would fit in the team.

Stephen Drew: Makes sense. And we're really good advice because I agree. Sometimes people can get disheartened in the search for that. However, it's still, I still always encourage people to reach out because like you say, things change and they can keep you in mind for future. Even if you're not looking. And on that word, the future, I got two kind of questions around that.

So first of all, I have to ask, because we're in the year now, people have talked about AI. Oh, it's going to replace our jobs. Don't worry about it. [00:38:00] This is really useful. This is a waste of time. What's your opinion on AI at the moment? Do you use it a little bit in the business? Do you, are you worried about it?

Do you embrace it? What's your kind of thoughts on it?

Ana Moisin: I think I'm not really worried about this, about it in terms of, oh, they will take our jobs. We have embraced it as a studio very well. I think it helps with visualizing some very early concepts, but what it throws out sometimes can be quite challenging. quite misleading. We more often than not have to go in and actually tweak quite a bit of what, an AI generated image, for example.

But I think AI is good at the moment and I think it will it helps with early exploration or early project exploration. As you, as we were discussing before, how do we Show the client initially, this amazing concept that is maybe in our heads but is not on paper yet. I think AI can bridge a little bit that gap, although, of [00:39:00] course, it has its limitations because, you have to talk to it in a specific way.

I'm quite embracing this because I have a Mathematics and sort of software developing background, so I'm quite happy with that. You can see all our projects are by geometric, so I think that's almost,

Stephen Drew: Okay. We, I can see now the trick, the secrets out of the bag.

Ana Moisin: The secret is out of the bag. I think, yeah, for us it's just a great tool. We would love to see how it develops. Yeah, I think it's quite far away from taking our jobs and if it does in the future, then, so be it. We can just go and live by the beach and here we go. We'll do a lot of designs by then, so not too worried about it.

Stephen Drew: Exactly. I don't think that's going to happen, but if it happens, I think it will be not just interior designer architecture. It will be a bit more of a cultural, like what do we do? But I do think that using it to do the mundane tasks in business can really help. I think it helps me because I'm not always the [00:40:00] best at starting from.

For example, a white page, and it can, in terms of text, get me going. And it's interesting to hear you talk about the video the images, even that's come a long way in a year or two. But like you said, I think it's surface level, isn't it? It doesn't really know the products. It makes things up. It doesn't get things quite right.

So it's really

Ana Moisin: Yeah, it's hard for them to get the, the general gist of what you want, especially if it doesn't exist, because I think the algorithm really probably creates images for something that it has already there in the bank of images. But if you're trying to show the client something completely new, of course, this completely new is still based on if you distill it down, it's still, a mesh and the light and something else.

But as a composition, it's still. It just transforms into something beautiful that's working. I think AI at the moment at least can't just get all these pieces and piecemeal them together and give you the [00:41:00] same result, but I think it definitely does. In three seconds you can get a really good image of a corner that you could think work.

It helped us in a presentation probably last year, maybe summer last year when we were trying and it's confidential, so I can't talk about it too much.

Stephen Drew: okay. Yeah.

Ana Moisin: concept where we were developing a product as well in the space as well as the interior design of the space but by this product is quite new and it's nothing that you can nothing that you can pinpoint in reality, of course, Georgia, she was doing quite a bit to try and convince the AI to give us what we want, which it did quite well for, for for maybe a day's worth of our time.

Fiddling around with the software.

Stephen Drew: Makes complete sense. That's really good to know. The last question I had was the future and maybe we talked a bit about the tech. However, the sector, hospitality, are you excited for where it's going at the moment? And the, in your words, [00:42:00] experiential hospitality to you. Are you excited?

Do you think that's going to grow as we keep going?

Ana Moisin: Yeah, absolutely. We are extremely excited about the future of hospitality and experiential hospitality, both together. We love hospitality for so many different reasons. But I think, we've seen concepts moving around internationally, so concepts that start in London or in the UK move around internationally, so it's really nice to see the growth and adaptability to the new markets.

We have one Project completing in a couple of weeks, not a couple, a little bit more, a few weeks.

Stephen Drew: Ooh,

Ana Moisin: And that's in the US, so I'm definitely excited about what the future holds. And yeah, we are keen in growing in different fields as well. Of course, we, as you've seen, we are doing little bits of residential as well, and hospitality and larger sort of work.

Hotel Project. So we would try to grow in these aspects. But yeah, [00:43:00] definitely excited about about experiential hospitality in the future.

Stephen Drew: very good. Very good. Me too. And I especially look forward to visiting them as well. The

Ana Moisin: Please do.

Stephen Drew: want to see the, I want to see the F1 car on the ceiling. Now, before we go, I just think sometimes it's very unfair that I ask you lots of questions, you don't get to ask me any questions at all. I was wondering if you have one or two quick questions that you'd like to ask me.

Anything you want, I'm all yours. And I will answer honestly and live. And I don't know these audience. So Anna could ask me anything. What would you like to ask?

Ana Moisin: What do you think is the future of Architecture Social? Yeah.

Stephen Drew: That's a good one. I, it changes all the time. I'm very happy with the podcast. I love it. I think that we released something that they call, I know it was a side project called ArcGPT and I put it on there and it was basically. It was one that it runs on chat GPT, but I also feed into it.

Certain information curated for an architecture audience. It's been interesting to see [00:44:00] that's been taken up a lot as well. So I don't know. At the start of the pandemic, there was. The big community forum and after the pandemic, that went a bit quieter. Now the podcast is doing well. I think I'd like to keep looking at different aspects of the business because architecture is the built environment and who do architects work with interior designers like yourself, all this stuff.

So on the podcast, on the journey goes, but in terms of the. It is a vehicle and the, we do recruitment that financially keeps us alive. And I like meet in different studios and that's an important part, but. There's also the fun part, right? Which is currently the podcast currently a few things.

So I'm up, I'm open for experimentation. I always say to people that. The structure's there and we can do cool stuff. So I don't know, I think one of the goals down the line in a year or two, and I've not got there, but I keep talking about it. I know is I would like to finally be the architecture [00:45:00] social in real life, preferably in a good space, so that could be good for the whole hospitality thing. I think that will be the goal, but I've got to get that. I'm a, we're getting there, we're getting there, you can't just rock up to the park with a few beers. This needs to be a bit more of a classy thing. It needs to be, somewhere nice, like the F1, beautiful bar, or maybe it can, maybe I quite like crazy golf indoors, so who knows?

Ana Moisin: I'm sure now that you've spoken about them so highly on this podcast, I'm sure they would not be, not mind giving you a bit of a space.

Stephen Drew: They let,

Ana Moisin: So

Stephen Drew: maybe they let me in once but never let me in again. We'll see. No, I promise I'm good. I promise I'm good. Sorry. I am going to F1, I will not play with the car on the roof. I promise you, but listen, Anna, you've been an absolute delightful guest. I really appreciate all you've done. And the last thing before you go for the audio, as well as the visual listeners.

Can you tell us if [00:46:00] someone's enjoyed this, they want to get in contact to work with you or work for you or whatever, or want to learn more, how do they find you?

Ana Moisin: yeah, I think you have it on the screen. Of course, we have a contact form on the website. They can reach us through LinkedIn. Instagram our email, which is design at anamostudio. com. But of course all that, all those details are on the website, so they can just go on the website and there is a way to contact us.

You have our phone number as well, if you ever need us. But by all means, yeah. And if you have, if any of our your guests have any further questions after this we would be delighted to help.

Stephen Drew: Excellent. My goodness. Gotta be careful with that gesture, but

Ana Moisin: Yeah.

Stephen Drew: I appreciate the sentiment.

Ana Moisin: We didn't give, we didn't give a lead time on the reply though, so

Stephen Drew: Give Anna a second, but the intention is there. Listen, Anna, thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate it. Stay on the stage one second while I end the live stream, because I want to say before we go a massive thank [00:47:00] you to everyone here.

We did get a question that popped up talking about employment. How do I look for a job on all that stuff? Stuff I promise you all that stuff is on the architecture social. com. There are free resources to help you with your job search. You can check it out there. If you're worried about anything, they've got lots and lots of that at length at the architecture, social.

com forward slash resources. So I will pick it up and you can also message me, but hopefully that's useful. I've done as much as possible for free so that you have it for free. If you really want to pay me for my time, I will take your money. But I promise you there's no secrets. It's all there for free.

And on that,

Ana Moisin: Pinterest might pay you now.

Stephen Drew: yeah Pinterest and Autodesk, I am coming for you. Maybe, in Vectorworks I like better Vectorworks and we've got some stuff in the interior design space as well. But until then, thank you so much more content coming soon. I really appreciate you tuning in. And I know I can see the number of you [00:48:00] guys all here late, and if you're watching the replay, that's okay too.

But thank you so much. I'm gonna end the live stream now. Bye-Bye everyone. Have a lovely evening or morning or afternoon, wherever you are. Take care. Bye-Bye everyone. Take care.