Celebrating International Women's Day 2022

COULD YOU INTRODUCE YOURSELF & YOUR POSITION AT PENSON?

My name is Lan Yang, I’m Creative Director at global Architecture & Design Studio PENSON. This year will be my 11th year at PENSON! My previous role was Associate, and before that Senior Designer.

WHAT WAS YOUR EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND?

BDes(Hons) Interior and Environmental Design at Dundee University. A wonderful place to study!

HOW DID YOU START YOUR CAREER AS A DESIGNER?

I have always loved buildings and mega structures; I can even remember the day that I told myself – that’s it! I want to design buildings! That was me at age 6, stuck in traffic on a highway bridge in Beijing, staring at the skyline and the complicated ring roads, fascinated by how people built all these things. So, I think I started thinking about my design career pretty young.

After graduating with a design degree, I was fortunate enough to land my first job with a large international architectural practice, RMJM. I was working as an Interior Designer and mostly worked on educational buildings from schools to universities, commercial offices, and master planning. I was also part of the team who created the Commonwealth Games Village for Glasgow. As it was an international practice, I also loved working on projects and pitches around the world.

After three years I wanted a change; to be more involved with projects from start to finish and have more responsibility seeing a project at all stages. I discovered PENSON by coincidence in a feature from a magazine. They instantly stood out to me as the kind of young creative, but global studio I’d wanted to move to. The minute I joined I was able to start making my own mark on the company and grew with the brand. The rest is history!

WHAT WERE THE GREATEST LESSONS YOU LEARNT FROM THIS STAGE OF YOUR CAREER?

Not to get bogged down doing the same old. To be flexible, keep learning and evolving. Especially with the current climate; what’s happening around the world and our larger environment … I shouldn’t stop once I’m comfortable or used to a way of working. I need to keep picking up new skill sets and come up with creative solutions to cater for the forever changing briefs and challenges.

WHAT ARE YOUR PROJECT HIGHLIGHTS OF YOUR DESIGN CAREER AND WHY?

The Leadenhall building in London for sure – this is a project we’re currently working on. I’ve always admired it and have now worked on multiple floors within this landmark skyscraper. It is a challenging project considering the movement you have within the skyscraper, and the structural constraints. We had to work with various specialist teams to realise the job, working closely with structural engineers, acousticians, vibration engineers and other consultants. The finished project will be a post-covid era, new form of working, just like a members’ club that has all the functions to support people in life and work.

There’s full gym facility, climbing wall, fitness studios, music studios, and the most amazing thing is we managed to put in a real tree and 120sqm of real green surfaces. It caters for all types of spaces and scenarios – ranging from quiet focused work to lounges, to an events space with its own bar. We added the ability to monitor and adjust C02 levels and air quality. The lighting temperature changes throughout the day to reflect and work with the outdoor lighting conditions. The project also contributes to wider environmental issues, helping with the ash dieback in the UK as all workstations installed are solid timber. Specifying this ash helps to make use of this beautiful native species – rather than letting the timber go to waste.

HOW HAS YOUR CAREER PROGRESSED WHILST WORKING AT PENSON?

What’s great about PENSON is that it promotes multidisciplinary design which I love. From conceptual design to running live projects on site, I’ve rapidly progressed at PENSON. I push myself, don’t settle for the status quo with my designs, and I’m prepared to take on complex tasks.

The level of trust I receive from our CEO + Founder, Lee Penson, means that I’m always encouraged to grow and take on responsibilities. At PENSON we always force ourselves to challenge the norm. And we believe being challenged is the best progression.

WHAT DO YOU BRING TO THE ROLE OF CREATIVE DIRECTOR AT PENSON? DO YOU HAVE YOUR OWN DESIGN ETHOS OR PARTICULAR PASSIONS?

Because of the multidisciplinary experience that I had early in my career, it has widened my knowledge and interest across different sectors within the design industry. I guess what I bring to the role is the experience I gained from projects and from the numerous pitch experiences too. I continue to be inspired from the way I cross fertisilise knowledge with experience.

ARE THERE CAREER AMBITIONS WHICH YOU ARE YET TO ACHIEVE?

I won’t say I have one particular goal yet to achieve, but I’m always up for a challenge. New projects really excite me. I’m still waiting for that one even bigger project that could test my skills further. I’m really passionate about creating experiential design and realising it in a physical environment. I want to continue to create amazing sustainable spaces for everyone to enjoy.

PLEASE COULD YOU INTRODUCE YOURSELF AND YOUR POSITION AT PENSON?

I’m Asta Bijeike, also one of the Creative Directors at PENSON. Lan and I work together leading the teams and majority of projects at PENSON. I have design-led a large portion of projects at our studio and my strengths and passions are capturing, inventing, or reinventing brands’ experience through a holistic design approach.

WHAT WAS YOUR EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND?

To start with, I studied a wood engineering, technology, and design degree. Once I had that I then moved on to do Interior Design at Kingston University. This mixture of background knowledge has supported me so well at PENSON because all these skills have made me a well-rounded designer. I have a real appreciation of the design of furniture due to my wood engineering background too.

HOW DID YOU START YOUR CAREER AS A DESIGNER?

My favourite thing as a child was to dream about how I would create and redesign my house, or my friend’s houses. I was always thinking about all the possible different design scenarios. I also used to love to build with building blocks too, so, I always knew I wanted to be a spatial designer when I grew up.

My career started as a freelance designer for graphic design projects, but soon after I moved to do freelance private residential interior design because I realised my passions and skills were stronger placed here.

While I was looking for some design inspiration, I came across PENSON and their work. I immediately liked their style and their global approach, so I applied.

HOW HAS YOUR CAREER PROGRESSED WHILST WORKING AT PENSON?

My thirst for collaborations with other designers and my eagerness to learn means I’ve quickly progressed over my 11 years at PENSON. My cross section of knowledge and experience from my degree days has allowed me to progress very rapidly in my career.

HOW HAVE YOU EVOLVED AS A DESIGNER WHILST WORKING AT PENSON? WHAT HAS INFLUENCED ANY CHANGES?

Our CEO + Founder, Lee is very open to new ideas and he pioneers’ different ways of thinking. Throughout years of working closely with him, I have developed a strong design point of view and a very creative approach. He’s a great mentor.

I’ve been able to work on a range of projects across sectors, including a recent Penthouse for a private client. We looked at the project as an art house, but also as a combination and contrast of city living and bringing the natural world indoors. The resulting palette of materials was a cross section of these two contrasting ideas.

WHICH PROJECTS HAVE BEEN HIGHLIGHTS OF YOUR DESIGN CAREER AND WHY?

I love to be challenged, so I treat every project completely individually to learn new things and grow as a designer. My biggest passion is collaborating with other artists – this is something I’ve always wanted to do, and I had the opportunity at PENSON to do that. I sourced and commissioned nine independent local and international artists for our project JO&JOE Paris Gentilly for Accor Group. We co-created the brand with Accor Group which meant we could come up with something completely new. Artwork is inherently part of JO&JOE’s unique design story and reflects the life and style of its guests. The result is an interior experience that harmonises the brand as a clear disrupter. I wanted PENSON to design some of the artwork too – so the PENSON team secretly feature on a few of the private bathroom walls!

PENSON’s work for Investments Company SEI was all about bringing life to financial offices. The client had an extensive contemporary art collection (The West collection), with more than 40+ individual pieces that needed to be creatively showcased across the workspace. We set about creating a workplace that spoke a consistent visual language with the purity, slickness, and edginess of London’s art galleries.

Frasers Group’s new Global Head Office was a visionary project that I loved working on. The client was very similar to PENSON in their way of thinking. They were very open to new ways of working and ideas.

WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO DESIGNERS BEGINNING THEIR CAREER IN THE COMMERCIAL INTERIORS SECTOR?

I would advise to listen to your gut. Don’t design by aiming to please, but by voicing your own point of view. Question first how the space will feel, rather than how it will look.

ARE THERE CAREER AMBITIONS WHICH YOU ARE YET TO ACHIEVE? 

More and more I feel like the boundaries between design disciplines need to be blurred. We can see this already gaining pace because of the pandemic. This enables us to look at the design from a holistic point of view. I would love to experiment with different medias and of course to have some unique collaborations with even more artists and different forms of art.