Why modern design changed
✨ Watch on YouTube or listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
For centuries, buildings were designed with a single purpose in mind. Theatres staged plays, factories manufactured goods and railway stations moved passengers. Many have since found new lives through adaptation, but today's most successful spaces are increasingly conceived to do far more from the outset.
Georgina Godwin speaks with Alex Wills, co-founder of Interval, about why flexibility has become one of architecture's most valuable assets. Drawing on a career spanning live events, immersive technology and spatial design, Wills argues that the next generation of buildings will succeed not because they can be repurposed decades later, but because they are designed from day one to accommodate changing audiences, technologies and uses.
From the engineering behind the Las Vegas Sphere to the evolving campuses of Canary Wharf, 180 Strand and Here East, the conversation explores how developers are rethinking the relationship between space and experience. For Wills, the most important question is no longer what a building looks like, but how it will be used – not just on opening night, but for years to come.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
Experience design is not a finishing touch — it's a foundation. The biggest mistake in how we create spaces is treating technology, content and human experience as things to bolt on once the building is up.
Adaptability is the most underrated commercial asset in the built environment. A space that is only alive on Saturday nights and empty on Monday mornings is a space leaving money on the table.
The best spaces are never finished. From a Las Vegas billboard that became an immersive venue, to an Olympic broadcast centre that became an innovation campus, to a derelict Strand building that became one of London's most interesting creative addresses, the most compelling environments in the world share one quality: someone kept asking what they could become next, rather than assuming the opening day was the answer.
Watch the episode on YouTube below, or listen via your preferred podcast app.
