Kyle Bergman brings the story of architecture and design to the masses with the Architecture And Design Film Festival. The adff reviews more than 300 documentaries every year that focus on the nature of the built environment. They curate the best and show them in DC, New York, LA, Toronto, Vancouver and online to audiences with a passion for the design of the world around us.
In Ep. 42 “Telling Architecture’s Story In Film” of the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast, Bergman and host David Kepron talk about the power of film to express the meaning of architecture and design.
Founder & Festival Director – Architecture & Design Film Festival / New York
Architect Kyle Bergman founded the Architecture & Design Film Festival (ADFF) in 2009 and serves as its festival director. He has always recognized the strong connection between architecture and film and ADFF provides a unique opportunity to educate, entertain and engage people who are passionate about the world of architecture and design. Now in its 14th season, ADFF has grown to become the largest film festival dedicated to the creative spirit of architecture and design.
Mr. Bergman also serves as president of Pacific Rim Park (PRP) whose mission is to use the process of designing and building parks as a tool to connect people and communities around the Pacific. Mr, Bergman has been involved with PRP since its first park built in Vladivostok, Russia in 1994.
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Mr. Bergman has been involved with design/build education since 1992 when he created and moderated an architectural lecture series about the design/build process for the Smithsonian Institute. He has taught community design/build classes in the Dominican Republic for the Yestermorrow Design/Build School in Vermont, and served on their board of directors for 9 years.
An entrepreneur at heart, Mr. Bergman founded Alt Spec in 1999, a publishing company that produced a visual resource of unique and alternative products for architects and designers. He also produced a play, The Glass House, about the design and construction of two famous homes — Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House and Phillip Johnson’s Glass House.
SHOW INTRO:
When I was in college I took an elective in hypnosis and one of the few things that I learned during that course is that everyone can be hypnotized, to some degree. That degree has a lot to do with the individual’s ability to let themself go, to suspend disbelief, to have a strong imagination as well as the proclivity to get lost in story.
What I have always know about myself is that when I watch a movie, the outside world disappears. I am with Frodo on our way to Mordor, in a landing craft on the beach of Normandy on my way to Save Private Ryan, falling in love with the heroine, summiting the mountain… I could go on but you get the idea.
The same happens with great novels where I am fully in the narrative and I find portrayals of human excellence deeply moving.
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Over the years, I have found myself using expressions of famous novelists, musicians, architects and filmmakers as truisms to live my life by.
I love documentaries because I learn things I did not know. I love discovering how things work in our world and how things we often take for granted in out built environment are not there by happenstance but have come to be through an intense, and usually lengthy, process of collaborative making.
I often stand in places and I’m amazed at the amount of decisions that had to be made to bring the thing that I’m experienced into the world.
This is no small thing and it’s something that I think the general public is unaware of. I would hazard a guess that most walk through their environments blissfully unaware of the magnitude of human invention and hard work that it took to bring most buildings to the world.
There have been stories I have read – biographies, monographs and radio shows and podcasts that I have listened to that have described the lives of famous makers, builders, architects, artists, designers and musicians – these alchemists of human ingenuity bringing things to the world that are lasting expressions of what it means to be human – in a certain place – at a certain time.
And so, it’s probably not so surprising that documentaries that focus on the work of architects or TV shows that show how things are made or how to make them better or how our built world has come to be I find particularly fascinating.
I think that if people better understood architecture and design, and the intricate set of interdependencies and decisions made to make the beautiful building or ice cream scoop, the world of design and architecture maybe experienced with more reverence.
I’ve often heard it also said that architects tend to make buildings for architects and the much of the subtlety and deep meaning of what architects and designers do is lost on the general public.
And this may be, in part , due to the fact that architects haven’t been too good at explaining what they do to the public.
In the past there were various guilds, associations of craftsmen or merchants that formed for mutual aid and protection and for the furtherance of their professional interests.And indeed, knowledge of the craft was often held in confidence among its members.
I’ve often heard it also said that architects tend to make buildings for architects and the much of the subtlety and deep meaning of what architects and designers do is lost on the general public. Maybe this is a hold-over from ancient guilds. If so, the consequence has been a poor understanding of the world of architecture and one that needs some revision.
This is just one of the mandates that Kyle Bergman and the architecture and design Film Festival have set out for themselves in bringing stories of architecture and design to the general public.
The architecture and design Film Festival attempts to write that story in a different way.
To bring the art and science of architecture and design, what it means, why we do it and how we do it, to the general public so they better understand the nature of the built world and what it means to be a participant in it.
ArchitectKyleBergman founded the Architecture & Design Film Festival (ADFF) in 2009 and serves as its festival director. He has always recognized the strong connection between architecture and film and how the ADFF can provide a unique opportunity to educate, entertain and engage people who are passionate about the world of architecture and design.
Now in its 14th season, ADFF has grown to become the largest film festival dedicated to the creative spirit of architecture and design.
Kyle Bergman has been involved with design/build education since 1992 when he created and moderated an architectural lecture series about the design/build process for the Smithsonian Institute.
He has taught community design/build classes in the Dominican Republic for the Yestermorrow Design/Build School in Vermont, and served on their board of directors for 9 years.
He is also the president of Pacific Rim Park (PRP) whose mission is to use the process of designing and building parks as a tool to connect people and communities around the Pacific.
The architecture and design Film Festival now screens about 300 documentary films every year. They curate the best of them and bring them to the public in major cities across the US and Canada as well as releasing them online.
Because of the work of Kyle Bergman, the general public continues to be invited into a deeper understanding of architects, designers and the nature of the built environment.
The architecture critic Paul Goldberger has said “Architecture begins to matter when it brings delight and sadness and perplexity and awe along with a roof over our heads.”
For the past 13 or 14 years, the architecture and design Film Festival has brought together the story of architecture and design offering those who participate a felt sense of delight and sadness, a deeper appreciation for the complexity of the practice of design and architecture and a sense of awe about the magic and meaning of buildings.
David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe.
David is a former VP – Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels.
In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies.
As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace.
David currently brings his creativity and insight on brand experiences to an international audience as a member of VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, as a Board Member of the Interactive Customer Experience Association (ICXA) and Sign Research Foundation’s (SRF) Program Committee.
He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore.
In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com.
In September of 2020, he launched the “NXTLVL Experience Design” podcast which brings listeners dialogues about “DATA: Design, Architecture, Technology and the Arts.” His guests include thought leaders who are driven by a passion to create the ‘New Possible’ and promote new paradigms of experiences into the mainstream.
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