Valerie Allen ’75 BFA and Armin Mersmann
Visual Artists and Podcast Hosts | Midland, MI
Art Ladders: The Creative Climb Podcast – Empowering Artists Through Conversation

The podcast “Art Ladders: The Creative Climb” was founded in 2021 by artists Valerie Allen and Armin Mersmann. Art Ladders motivates and uplifts fellow artists through a mix of interviews and “coffee hour” conversations about issues such as artist’s block, marketing for creatives, and competing in juried exhibits. Allen and Mersman will share highlights from the most popular episodes in the Art Ladders’ library.

Hal Apple ’82 BSDE 
Designer and Publisher | Azusa, CA 
WOMEN. SERIOUSLY?

In his video presentation, Hal Apple draws connections between a 1990s medical school anatomy class, a Mantis shrimp, and art museums to explore gender bias and the role men have played in defining societal gender norms. How have artists, architects, designers and planners broken the boundaries for those who are not men? Or, have our professions simply not seen the boundaries? Please join Hal Apple in learning how to innovate our work by embracing new paradigms.

Ron Paul Baum ’71 BSARC 
Designer and Facilitator, Arts and Crafts Continuum | Woodinville, WA
Arts & Crafts Continuum: Emerging Creative Land Use Project

Ron Paul Baum explores the first two years of the design, development and implementation of an experimental project centered on creative community living. The Arts and Crafts Continuum community invites a diverse group of creatives to learn, create work and profit independently while living collaboratively in affordable residences on debt-free land. Baum questions how this type of community might be sustained and replicated creating a network of communities where creativity thrives.   

Kyle Campbell ’12 MARCH
Senior Associate, Champlin Architecture | Cincinnati, OH
Motz HQ: Global Company, Community Commitment

The Motz Group specializes in creating sports fields and stadia around the world.  With such a broad reach, they could have built their new headquarters anywhere. Instead, they chose to remain rooted in their community of Newtown, Ohio, and transform a blighted property into a community hub that could catalyze growth and unity. Kyle Campbell of Champlin Architecture partnered with The Motz Group to help the company turn its vision into reality. This presentation tells the story of a global company’s work to demonstrate its uncompromising commitment to local community.   

Don Jacobs ’67 BSARC
Principal, Don Jacobs Architect Inc.| Corona del Mar, CA
Case Study: Winery Tasting Room

Learn how Don Jacobs incorporated the natural beauty of the landscape into the design of the Tasting Room and Event Center for Casino Mine Ranch winery in Plymouth, Calif. in northern California’s Shenandoah Valley. With a four-acre pond at the entry, surrounded by willows, oaks and pines, the site already had a natural focus. An ancient oak with a spread of 80 feet sits above the pond, forming a part of the entry to the tasting room, whose west facing wall opens to a grand terrace highlighting expansive views of the property.

Megan Mays ’08 BSDE 
Product Manager, Lone Wolf Technologies | Cincinnati, OH
Agile Revolution: Embracing ‘Product Gems’ for Simplicity and Success

In the fast-paced world of agile product development, maintaining user satisfaction can be challenging — especially when faced with a packed roadmap or larger deliverables on the horizon. Customers expect consistent delight, regardless of the project’s scale. This presentation will cover embracing simplicity in your product development process, common challenges in agile product development, and how complexity often stands in the way of success. Megan Mays will discuss simplicity as a game-changer in building great products that users love, including a new framework called Product Gems and the success stories that highlight this approach. 

Alex Pesta ’02 BARC
Principal Planner / President, City Architecture | Cleveland, OH
Building a Culture of Experience

What happens when an architect, who has centered his design approach on people, is entrusted to rebuild a legacy firm’s culture? This session will focus on how Alex Pesta applied a people-based design approach to the day-to-day operations of a 25-year-old firm. The presentation expands the concept of a “project that impacts the human experience” by showing how thinking about the human experience in every interaction, both internal and external, can make incredible changes to the practice of planning and architecture. 

Scott Shall ’98 BSARC
Founding Director, International Design Clinic; Founding Principal, houm PLLC; Associate Professor, Lawrence Technological University | Southfield, MI
Building at the Edge: Reconstructing Design Practice within Improvised Settlements

In 1950, only 86 cities in the world held over one million people. Today there are over 500, with United Nations projections of 660+ by 2030. Although some of this growth will occur within large cities, most will happen within the second-tier cities of developing countries, resulting in the production of improvised settlements at a scale yet unseen. To meet the challenges and opportunities presented by this emerging world of rusted metal and blue plastic tarp, the designer must trade the rigid hierarchies embedded within patronage-based practices for more inclusive and heterarchical processes. Scott Shall will use the tactics and works of communication theorists, guerrilla artists and counter-culture warriors to showcase three projects founded upon these principles.

Matthew Spoleti ’23 BSDE
Communication Designer | Cincinnati, OH
Empathizing with Apathy

How do you get a drunk college student to take action if they see someone overdosing? How do you empathetically design a system for those who are apathetic toward the content? How can tone and aesthetics drive a person to care? Matthew Spoleti will discuss how he created safety resources for college house shows for his capstone project titled SHOWTOOLS. Spoleti will share the challenges of this project and how to design important information in a way that makes those who wouldn’t usually care, begin to care.

Joe Walsh ’15 BSDE
Artist, Joe Walsh Studio | Cincinnati, OH
Drawing Leads the Way

Joe Walsh went to DAAP for graphic design, but always made drawing the main priority. In the years since graduating, Walsh has doubled down on that passion. In this talk, he will discuss his career journey through the interconnected worlds of design, film and art, led always by the desire to draw. He’ll also cover his award-winning animation work on the documentary “Why We Walk” and the comic he is currently working on.