Jessica Dance on Building a Sustainable Creative Business

One Man, 500 Chairs

What do you mean a chair can have over 500 different iterations — by a single designer? That’s not a typo. Hans Wegner, one of Denmark’s most celebrated furniture designers, is credited with somewhere north of 500 chairs over his career. Not 500 sales. 500 distinct designs. He’s still known, simply, as “the master of the chair.” By the 1920s and ‘30s, Denmark had started moving away from the ornate, hand-decorated world of Skønvirke and toward something leaner: Danish Functionalism. It shared the Bauhaus belief that beauty should come naturally from function — but it added something distinctly Danish: a deep respect for the human body. Danish functionalists didn’t just ask “does this work?” They asked “does this work for a person?” Furniture and lighting were designed around standard human measurements. Materials were left to show their own inherent beauty rather than being dressed up. The goal wasn’t luxury — it was practical, beautiful design for everyone, in step with Denmark’s growing social democracy. This is the era that gave us the idea — now almost a cliché, because it’s been copied so often — that a well-designed chair shouldn’t just look good. It should fit you. In Practice Kaare Klint, often called the founder of modern Danish design, built his whole practice around human proportion. His 1933 Safari Chair was designed to be knocked down and packed flat for travel — no tools needed. His 1927 Propeller Stool folds into a perfect cylinder. Function, solved elegantly. Hans Wegner took that foundation and ran — 500 times. His 1950 Wishbone Chair is still in production today: a Y-shaped bentwood armrest, a seat hand-woven from paper cord. Comfort, before anything else. Nanna Ditzel, the “First Lady of Danish Furniture Design,” trained as a cabinetmaker in an almost entirely male field — and then rebelled against the wood-only orthodoxy, experimenting with fiberglass, foam, and wicker. Her 1959 Hanging Egg Chair is still iconic. TAKT, a contemporary Danish furniture company, designed the Cross Chair — the first piece of furniture to earn the EU’s official environmental footprint score. Four pieces, six screws, fully disassemble-able at the end of its life. Same philosophy, new century. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe [https://creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

The Heart Hidden in a Letter: the Danish g

Somewhere in the Danish alphabet, there’s a lowercase letter shaped like a heart. It’s the “g” — and unlike the two-story ‘g’ most of us grew up writing, the Danish version is open, single-story, with a softly slanted tail that curls into something close to a heart. It’s not a font trend or a branding gimmick. It’s a hundred-year-old design decision, born from a movement most people have never heard of: Skønvirke. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe [https://creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Reimagining Creative Education in the Age of AI | Chris Mitchell, Royal College of Art

A few years ago, Dr. Chris Mitchell did something unsettling in his classroom at the Royal College of Art. He fed the same assessment brief his students were working on into a generative AI tool and then asked the students to evaluate the output. Almost all of them said it was a pass. He looked at it again on the train home, and thought: yeah, I think so too. His first reaction was terror. His second was more useful. “It was a reflection of my bad assessment design.” If an AI could pass it, he realised, then the assessment was never really measuring the things that mattered — curiosity, imagination, personal investment in the work. It was measuring the ability to compare and summarise information. Generative AI is very good at that. But that is not what creative education is actually for. So he redesigned it. Instead of comparing X and Y, he asked students to take a teaching session that had meant something to them — personally, formatively — and redesign it, explaining why. The results were completely different. Impossible to fake. “We had examples of people drawing on learning in a choir, or a workshop around ocarina making,” he told me. “It’s just so much fun to mark.” That moment captures something important about where we are with AI and education right now — and it’s just one thread in a really rich conversation. Chris is Head of Academic Strategy Development at the RCA and the creator of the MA in Creative Education. We talked for over an hour about what formal education is genuinely for, why the RCA builds everything around making and reflection, how hybrid learning can be done well (and what goes wrong when it isn’t), and why creativity is something every person can access — not a trait some people have and others don’t. We also got into the RCA’s long-standing pass/fail grading system — no marks, just detailed written feedback — and what it demands from both tutors and students. 👉 Watch the full conversation on YouTubehttps://youtu.be/BIrrwVRFUzc [https://youtu.be/BIrrwVRFUzc] 👉 Read the blog post [https://bloomerangas.com/blog/reimagining-creative-education-in-the-age-of-ai-insights-from-royal-college-of-art/]https://bloomerangas.com/blog/reimagining-creative-education-in-the-age-of-ai-insights-from-royal-college-of-art/ [https://bloomerangas.com/blog/reimagining-creative-education-in-the-age-of-ai-insights-from-royal-college-of-art/] I hope it sparks something for you — whether you work in education, whether you’re a creative practitioner thinking about AI, or whether you’re just curious about what it looks like to build an institution around the act of making things. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe [https://creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Can creativity be taught? | KTU, Head of Design Centre

Can creativity be taught? This is the question we explored in the newest episode of Bloomerangas with Ruta Valušytė [https://www.linkedin.com/in/r%C5%ABta-valu%C5%A1yt%C4%97-b8580b27/], Head of the Design Centre at Kaunas University of Technology. Every person has the native ability to create. But like any muscle, creativity needs to be used, trained, and nurtured. If we stop using it, it fades. If we practise it, it becomes more natural and intuitive. What I found especially interesting in this conversation is that creativity does not necessarily need complete freedom. Very often, a blank canvas blocks people. What helps is a thoughtful structure: a clear task, a useful example, a safe environment, and enough freedom to experiment. Ruta describes this as a kind of creative playground: a space where people can explore, fail, try again, and slowly build confidence in their own creative process. Surely, this resonates with us very much as we create creativity playgrounds [https://bloomerangas.com/creativity-playgrounds/] for offices and spaces for exactly this purpose. We also spoke about AI. AI can be a fantastic tool, but it is still a tool. Ruta compared it to a pencil: if you know what you want to draw, it can help you. But it cannot replace your intention, your judgement, or your imagination. This feels especially important now, when creativity and innovation are so often discussed through the lens of speed and productivity. AI can generate quickly, but true innovation still requires us to question the status quo, define the right challenge, and imagine something that does not yet exist. In the episode, we also talk about: * how universities can nurture creativity * why struggle is part of the creative process * why structure and play need each other * how design education can support a more sustainable future * what it means to design beyond only human users * why curiosity is still one of the most important creative skills One of the strongest ideas from the conversation is that a creative environment is not only about tools, studios, or technology. It is about culture. It is about the values, behaviours, and ways of thinking that make people brave enough to explore something unknown. I hope you will enjoy this talk as much as I did. Read the full summary here [https://bloomerangas.com/blog/can-creativity-be-taught/]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe [https://creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

How to protect your focus, creativity, and wellbeing in a digital world

In our latest Bloomerangas Podcast [https://bloomerangas.com/blog] episode, I speak with Lina Žemaitytė-Kirkman [https://www.linkedin.com/in/linazemaitytekirkman/], Head of Rockit (a Startup and Innovation Centre) about something many of us are feeling right now: how hard it has become to stay focused, creative, and mentally clear in a world of constant digital input. We explore why digital overload affects more than productivity, how boredom and rest support creativity, and what simple habits can help us protect our attention in the age of AI. It’s a thoughtful and practical conversation for anyone who wants to feel less scattered and create with more clarity. Watch the episode below, listen on substack/spotify/Apple Podcasts or read the summary on our blog [https://bloomerangas.com/blog/how-to-protect-your-focus-and-creativity-in-a-digital-world/]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe [https://creativity.bloomerangas.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]