This issue of Differentiated Design is sponsored by Humanscale . I recently got the Freedom Chair - it is beautiful, extremely well designed, and super comfortable.

Our home tour films this week, and life outside of that does not stop. I've been scrambling like a maniac to get everything right. We're so close to the finish line.

I invited over our friend Carly Ripp, a super talented designer, who gave us a few last-minute ideas. We wanted quick, raw, unfiltered feedback on everything she saw that wasn't working. Our styles are different yet complementary, which I really love.

She gave us these sconces, love em!

I'm usually the one doing this in our friends' homes, so it was nice to be in the passenger seat.

You always have blind spots, and the longer you are in a space, the greater they grow. Because I spend most days working from home, I constantly look at it, and it's hard to see it with fresh eyes.

One thing she suggested was just massing more of our houseplants together, which is funny because I assumed I had way too many, and she thought we needed more.

There's usually more than one way to solve a design problem, so when you enlist another person, you come up with a solution you wouldn't have yourself.

I thought our fireplace needed height - tall things like candleholders stacked on top of it - and she thought it was plenty high and needed contrast. She was right.

I hope you have a design friend like this, and if you don't, see if you can find one. It's a wonderful exercise and a great way to be vulnerable with somebody and allow them to critique and express what they do and don't like in your home, the most personal of spaces.

taste vs building

I saw this new interview with Ben Uyeda on About Art. Ben is an architect-turned multidisciplinary maker/artist/hotelier. He created Reset Hotel, where we stayed in Joshua Tree recently, and I got to spend a little time with him while we were there. A quote really stood out to me:

"The difference between creativity and taste. The culture we're in right now is mistaking having great taste for being creative. People are mistaking consumption with production, and I think creativity is always about production."

It's second nature for me to curate lots of great design ideas and products at this point. It's what I constantly do online.

It's much, much harder, and probably much more valuable, to build great things.

Ben is on top of the moon pad, a star-gazing seat he made at Reset.

I just sat down with Lyon Porter, the guy who created Urban Cowboy and the Ziggurat House that I wrote about two weeks ago.

What struck me about this fella was that he just makes things happen. He is a creative machine, whether it is boutique hotels, apartment renovations, flips, dive bars, high-end bars, custom furniture, tile, or screen-printed bandanas.

Urban Cowboy Bar - The Arcade Nashville

I don't think much of his mind is devoted to "will this work?" or "does that make money?" or "is there a market for that?" What he does in almost no way fits on a spreadsheet.

It's simply a desire for something to exist that should exist.

This is the beating heart of the builder artist. It makes me realize I overthink things way too much. I don't actually build enough.

If you spend much time around either Ben or Lyon, you start to realize that you are actually capable of so much more. They bring things into existence at a furious pace. And money has come as a byproduct of that wonderful creativity and drive.

You can do this too. We all can and should. Picking up a hammer, planting a garden, designing a chair, a rug, or a lamp, or perhaps even restoring an old building to become the new cultural center of the neighborhood, is actually the antidote to the digital fatigue we all feel.

the final countdown

taste vs building

two weeks