In recent years, a growing number of design studios have been juggling client work while actively shaping cultural discourse – hosting podcasts, launching talk series, and even staging full-blown festivals. By choosing to amplify their values through their self-initiated platforms, they’re blurring the lines between maker and curator.
Take, for example, Studio Dumbar/DEPT®, which launched the DEMO Festival; Lucky Dip, with its The NDA Podcast; or Apropos, whose Highly Opinionated platform interrogates art, activism, and cultural resistance through talks, interviews, and workshops.
This naturally raises the question – why are studios stepping beyond their role as creators to become cultural voices, making space for important conversations around creativity and community? What drives the hunger to do more than just design? And how is running these platforms reshaping both their practice and their client relationships?
Often, in launching these platforms, studios are picking up conversations that started elsewhere to give them more space and a bigger audience.
For Lucky Dip, adjusting to remote working meant the team lost the water cooler conversations in the studio. Co-founder Katie Cadwell found herself missing the post-work debrief, chatting about the good, bad, and ugly parts of working in the industry. “It’s hard to have those informal chats sitting on a Google Meet,” she says.
So the team launched The NDA Podcast, an unfiltered forum where designers share candid, behind-the-scenes perspectives on the industry.
The many topics The NDA Podcast has explored
“I wanted to feel like I was sitting around a pub table listening in on a debate between peers. Podcasts really lend themselves to feeling that intimacy of conversation,” says Cadwell.
Cadwell and co-founder Hatty Wytton wanted to bring a truly unbiased view of the industry to the audience, and the fact that The NDA is a self-initiated platform definitely helped. “The beauty of it being a passion project means we don’t need to worry about sponsors or the bottom line.
“We can really focus on the topics. It also allows us the privilege of honesty without fear of repercussion,” says Wytton.
Delving into subjects like motherhood and creativity, managing finances, and the challenges of freelancing, The NDA quickly found an audience.
“The best episodes are the ones where we end with more questions than we started with,” says Cadwell, adding that the community has rallied around the project. “We’ve heard of agencies listening to episodes over the studio speakers, then having heated debates at lunchtime. If we can generate more conversations on tricky subjects, I think we’re doing our job,” she says.
A live recording of The NDA Podcast at Birmingham Design Festival, with host Katie Cadwell and guests Christopher Doyle and Elise Santangelo-Rous
Interestingly, making the podcast has directly shaped the foundations of the studio itself. As Wytton says, many of Lucky Dip’s values (called ‘“Rules of Play”) were pulled from the experience of creating The NDA.
“‘No egos,’ for example, is something we tell our guests. We don’t necessarily care about your journey or role, just your experience on the topic. It’s also something we use when choosing talent and clients to work with,” says Wytton.
The podcast is a good way for the team to live out their values, and quickly signal to others what they believe in. “Walking the walk as well as talking the talk,” she says.
“It demonstrates how much we love the industry we work in. We care enough to give back, we’re passionate enough to dedicate time and resources to it, and we love it enough to critique it,” adds Wytton. “It shows we plan to be here for the long haul, and hopefully see some of the changes we talk about.”
That same urge to move beyond pure design work and contribute to cultural discourse drove London and Geneva-based agency Apropos to launch Highly Opinionated, a platform that hosts talks, interviews, and workshops. On one hand, the initiative was a way for the Apropos team to unpack their interests, which range from design, architecture, and art, to urban development, climate change, and politics.
“These topics shape and affect the way we live; therefore, it was an innate desire to address them in an open dialogue through the creation of content and events around them,” says co-founder Alexios Seilopoulos.
At the same time, Highly Opinionated was born from a rejection of the ‘white label’ agency model. As Seilopoulos explains, design by nature demands thinking, critique, and challenging the norm. While it inevitably intersects with commerce, it’s not a purely corporate pursuit.
“I never believed in the corporate mantra that business is business and personal opinions should stay out of it. Until businesses are run entirely by robots, there will always be people behind them, and their voices deserve to be heard,” he explains.
A conversation between author and ACT UP member Sarah Schulman and London-based photographer Sunil Gupta on art and queer resistance, moderated by Alexios Seilopoulos
Through its newsletter, talks, and events – such as the conversation between author and ACT UP member Sarah Schulman and London-based photographer Sunil Gupta on art and queer resistance, moderated by Seilopoulos – Highly Opinionated has struck a chord, not just with audiences, but also with clients, who sometimes bring up the platform in early conversations.
“They understand the cultural capital that something like Highly Opinionated can bring to their brand,” says Seilopoulos. “They can see that the emotional connection that’s created through such an activation is immeasurable to any media buy or marketing effort. I’m not saying that standard ways of marketing are not needed, but nothing can beat an honest story.”
For Lucky Dip too, The NDA has become a calling card, reshaping how clients see the studio and what it stands for. “A lot of founders are invested in personal brand and how that can elevate their business. NDA is part of Lucky Dip’s personal brand. So it acts as proof that we know how to engage an audience – visually, socially, and audibly,” says Wytton. It also means that the studio now attracts clients with similar principles; ones who relate to the ideas Lucky Dip discusses in the podcast.
“The biggest shift we’ve felt is in how other agencies perceive us,” adds Wytton. “As a fairly young studio, NDA has put us on the radar for them.
“And we’ve been overwhelmed by the support, particularly from studios that have similar values to us. That probably puts us in the feeds of their client circles, too.”
Even when the support is motivating, it doesn’t erase the reality that sustaining an independent, unfunded cultural platform means constantly balancing time and money against the demands of a design studio. For both Lucky Dip and Apropos, it means setting their own pace.
“The whole process is very hard, and we don’t always get it right,” says Cadwell. “But the value we get from NDA keeps it a priority for us. It will never be a weekly podcast; we’re realistic about how much we can achieve. And luckily, our loyal listeners don’t mind waiting. That takes the pressure off, and allows us to be really proud of every episode we put out.”
The Highly Opinionated newsletter
But as these platforms grow, they ask more of the people behind them.
Studio Dumbar/DEPT® knows this well, having faced the challenge of quickly adapting to the scale and complexity of a growing event while organising the 2025 edition of DEMO Festival, an annual showcase of motion design that takes over public screens in cities around the world.
The idea for the festival, first launched in 2019, came to the team during a visit to a poster exhibition – could they give motion design the platform it had never had? “We envisioned an exhibition that would showcase motion design not just to designers, but to everyone, in the public space instead of an art space,” says creative director Liza Enebeis.
Since then, DEMO has witnessed a meteoric rise in popularity. This year, the curatorial team reviewed an impressive 5,400 motion works submitted from 92 countries, surpassing submissions from the past two editions.
With the display of more than 600 artworks in major cities like Amsterdam, Hamburg, Brussels, Barcelona, Vancouver, and Los Angeles, DEMO reached millions of visitors, further cementing its position as the world’s largest motion design event.
The fact that DEMO is put together by a design studio – as opposed to a cultural institution or media – gives it an entirely different purpose.
A visual from DEMO 2025
“Unlike other design festivals that take place in galleries, conference centres, or invite-only venues, DEMO turns an entire city into an open-air exhibition, using public screens,” says Enebeis. “The focus on celebrating great work, rather than organising a competition with a ranking, is very important to us. We’re sharing instead of competing.”
With projects like DEMO, The NDA, and Highly Opinionated, designers are no longer waiting for space. Instead, they’re creating their own, and using it to amplify their voices and shape culture on their own terms.
“Traditionally, designers and design studios were known to be rather introverted; great creative talent, but not so great in speaking out,” says Enebeis. “The fact that their voice is becoming stronger is really important for the community. We are creators, so coming up with new ideas to communicate is inherent to our craft.”
As Enebeis says, this also signals a larger shift in culture, where both people and brands feel less confined to their traditional corner.
“Cross-overs, exploring new territory, integrating other expertise; everything has become much more eclectic and open, in every field,” she says. “This trend will continue. But it doesn’t mean everyone will or should follow this trend.”
A visual from DEMO 2025
Seilopoulos echoes this, adding that he’d like to see more studios step up as cultural voices. “The question is, why do it? If the answer is an honest need to communicate something you believe in to a greater audience, then that’s the right reason,” he says.
“If it’s to get more clients, or be trendy, then it’s better to stick to a traditional agency model, because people will see through it quite quickly.”
The widening role of the designer – no longer limited to craft but extending into commentary, curation, and entrepreneurship – brings opportunities, but also pressures and pitfalls. The growing ask to be more than “just a designer” can quickly become overwhelming.
“We have to ask why we’re stepping outside of our roles as ‘designers.’ We’re expected to be influencers. Thought-leaders. Entrepreneurs. Podcasters. Speakers. It’s exhausting, really. It risks pulling us away from doing what we love and came here to do,” says Cadwell.
She is quick to stress that there’s no shame in keeping your focus squarely on the craft itself – producing great work and running a studio is more than enough, especially since pursuing side quests is often a privilege not everyone can afford.
“It’s not possible for everyone, and I don’t want to perpetuate the idea that you have to be ‘Creative &,’” she says. “But if people have a real passion and drive to create something that is ‘theirs,’ then power to them. It’s one of the most rewarding parts of my job.”