Breed Presents

The final guest for series four of Breed Presents is Suzanne Dean, Creative Director of Vintage, Penguin Random House. Impressive as it is, that title doesn't really reveal just how much cultural influence Suzanne has, as it means she's behind many of the cover designs for books found on our bookshelves.   Among the covers she personally designed are The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Sapiens, and Entangled Life, while authors she's worked with include Haruki Murakami, Toni Morrison, and Margaret Atwood. During her career her work has often been recognised, winning at the ABCD Awards, The British Book Design and Production Awards, and the V&A Illustration Awards. Plus, in 2023, she was named Designer of the Year at the British Book Awards. Of the many book covers designed by Suzanne and her team, we touched on a few specifically during our conversation, including James Fox's Craftland, Margaret Atwood's Paper Boat, Charlotte Higgins' Ukrainian Lessons, and What Did the Deep Sea Say? by Marion Coutts freelanced to designer Jon Gray, as well as many works by Haruki Murakami including After Dark, Sputnik Sweetheart, A Wild Sheep Chase, Norwegian Wood, Kafka on the Shore, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, End of the World and Hard-Boiled Wonderland. Instagram: @vintagebooks and @penguinrandomhouse 

Our guest for this episode is Hugh Miller – art director, graphic designer and Pentagram partner. We discuss Hugh's passion for typefaces and how they have been a theme running throughout his career, from those he designed when working inhouse for both Nokia and Microsoft, to his work with Type Directors Club New York after co-founding BOND London.   As well as also being a university lecturer, he maintains his own extensive design archive. We talk about the latter at length and go into detail discussing several pieces that are in his collection.   We also talk about Hugh's love of music, from his own personal musical tastes to discussing music packaging and design in general.   @neue_miller

Of all the Creative Directors we've spoken to on this podcast, our latest guest on Breed Presents David Rager still manages to stand out. Well, you tend to when you're creative directing NASA.   Perhaps his most momentous decision has been the reintroduction of the stylized logotype popularly known as the Worm, which is now used alongside the equally iconic insignia, known as the Meatball.   David arrived at NASA from a role with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Prior to that, he worked for Disney, the New Museum in New York, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. He's also the co-founder, with wife Cheri Messerli, of US/French design studio Weekends. And, if he has any spare time, he plays in a band, Massage.   Instagram: @davidrager @nasa

We're excited to bring you the next episode of Breed Presents because its guest is Ruthie Rogers, best known as the founder and owner of The River Cafe.   It's safe to say she's a creative mind, no matter what she turns her attention to. From co-founding The River Cafe alongside Rosie Gray, writing, designing and editing cookbooks, and now hosting her own podcast Ruthie's Table 4.   We discuss her recent books, Table 4 at The River Cafe, collecting interviews from the podcast, and Squeeze Me: Lemon Recipes and Art, a collaboration with artist Ed Ruscha.    Recorded at her home, designed by her late husband architect Richard Rogers, we also touch on her art collection, its meaning and importance. 

Ramdane Touhami is the guest in this episode of Breed Presents. Ramdane is not someone to get stuck in one creative silo - perhaps the best way to describe him would be as a creative editor. He is the founder of Words, Sounds, Colors & Shapes, which is described as a context rather than concept store in central Paris and he's also the owner of the Drei Berge Hotel in a spectacular spot in the Swiss Alps. Those two form part of our conversation, along with his creative agency Art Recherche Industrie, his ongoing fascination with the history and design of the counterculture, and the recently opened Papier Royal. @ramdanetouhami

In this episode, we talk to Will Hudson, who co-founded It's Nice That in 2007. It's Nice That subsequently span off in a number of different directions, including HudsonBec Group, creative agency Anyways, Creative Lives in Progress, which helps newcomers to the industry, and If You Could Jobs.  All have had one aim in mind – the promotion and opening up of the creative industries and the ideas they produce. In our conversation, we touch on the original vision Will and his friend and business partner Alex Bec had, when they set up It's Nice That while still at university in Brighton. And whether they could ever have foreseen how influential it's become in the years since.

For this episode of Breed Presents our guest is the Yorgo Tloupas. Not only is he Creative Director of his own design studio Yorgo&Co in Paris, but he's also a snowboarder, teacher and proprietor of his own Greek cafe, Yorgaki He started his design career while still a student, creating a line of snowboards for Rossignol. He was soon working on magazines in Paris and London, including founding Intersection with photographer Rankin. Recently, he's creative directed Les Inrockuptibles. We talk about all of this, plus his involvement in ski brand Black Crows.

We're joined by artist Polly Morgan for this episode of Breed Presents. Polly made her name working with taxidermy in her art, which evolved over the years into the creation of more sculptural pieces involving snakeskins, concrete and polyurethane. Our podcast chat took place at Polly's home near Stroud, and covered moving away from London, her home for many years, loss and grief, and all the experiences and inspirations that feed into her work. We also touch on her recent transition into being a curator for exhibitions by other artists. @pollymorganartist

We're excited to be joined by Graydon Carter for the latest episode of Breed Presents. A legendary figure in the world of magazine publishing and beyond, Graydon was editor of Vanity Fair for 25 years until 2017. Before that, he was co-founder and editor of the highly influential Spy magazine, and in recent years he was co-editor of weekly newsletter Air Mail, co-founded with Alessandra Stanley.   Last year, he published an immensely enjoyable autobiography, When the Going was Good: An Editor's Adventures During the Last Golden Age of Magazines, which forms the core of our conversation. 

We're kicking off a new series of Breed Presents – our fourth – and what better way to begin than with Neil Wenman, the Global Creative Director of Hauser & Wirth. Hauser & Wirth began as a gallery founded by Iwan and Manuela Wirth and Ursula Hauser in 1992. It's come quite a way since then and now represents over a hundred artists with gallery locations around the world. Our conversation took place looking out across the vista of London from the windows of his Mayfair office. That conversation took in Neil's achievements during 15 years at Hauser & Wirth, working with and for the artistic community it represents, Ursula magazine, and how he went from an early fascination with architecture to working at the centre of the artistic world. We also talked about his work with the arts and mental health charity Hospital Rooms, which commissions art for hospital spaces and provides art workshops for patients and NHS staff.