PODCAST

Make Life Better. By Design

Kevin Drayton

A podcast about design and how it can make life better, for all of us.

arts design

All Episodes

15:33

Episode 18: Why Is There a Housing Crisis?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/10/28

Most people acknowledge that there is a housing crisis in this country. There is less agreement on why and how it should be tackled. Kevin Drayton sets out some thoughts on a number of possible causes for this long standing problem.

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19:53

Episode 17: Better by Design or Worse by Accident?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/10/21

How can we all be the same but different at once? Every coin has two sides and there are no guarantees in life - except death and taxes. This episode looks at the paradoxes involved in trying to make life better and why there's no point worrying about getting things wrong.

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13:33

Episode 16: (How Easily Can You) Put Your Hand On It?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/10/15

What you have is up to you. But do you know where all of it is, and can you put your hand on it quickly when you need to? Everything needs a home, but what and where that home is can greatly help or hinder your day to day life. A quick reminder of the basics of storage.

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24:24

Episode 15: Do You Need Help Listening to This?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/10/06

Hearing loss continues to carry a whiff of stigma. People happy to wear glasses, get their teeth fixed and exercise regularly may still be reluctant to adopt hearing aids. But design came to the rescue some time ago. The dramatic take up of earbuds means that having something shoved in your lugs no longer shouts 'disabled'. Design development has also moved hearing aids into the chic accessories or 'wearables' market; which if it means you can seek help for your hearing loss without fee...

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12:57

Episode 14: What Would Make YOUR Life Better?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/09/27

Before we can apply ourselves to making our lives better, we need to understand exactly what that means for us. It is likely that we'll need to look behind the simple response of 'more money' or something similar. Until we can be specific about what a better life will look, sound and taste like, it is unlikely we'll get far in reaching it.

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27:42

Episode 13: Interview with Nathan Clegg (and the...

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/09/12

Keen to get a graphic designer's take on if and how design can make life better, I set up an interview with Nathan Clegg, only to find that I must have made a schoolboy error setting up my mike. Unwilling to throw away Nathan's comments, I tried to salvage my part of the interview, with little success. Mea culpa.

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13:04

Episode 12: Ways with Words

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/09/02

Following on from Episode 11, this time taking a quick look at the development of writing, printing and electronic communication: how they relate to signage and how they all affect our quality of life.

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22:39

Episode 11: Signs of the Times

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/08/26

Good signage is the perfect combination of form and function. Tracing the Roman origins of classic letterforms and why they continue to be relevant today. First of a short series.

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11:28

Episode 10: Clothes - Packaging the Person

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/08/19

We wear clothes all the time. The scope for clothes to make life better is huge. Do we pay clothing the attention it deserves?

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16:48

Episode 09: When is a Door Not a Door?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/08/12

We all encounter doors and the handles, hinges and their other associated paraphenalia every day of our lives. But how much thought do we give them? A perhaps unconsidered opportunity to Make Life Better. By Design.

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51:55

Episode 8: Finding Common Ground

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/08/04

A conversation with personal training business expert and blogger Matt Robinson. Quickly finding common ground in good design as problem-solving, we discover just how close our different interests are.

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10:16

Episode 7: Something Old, Something New

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/08/01

Newness has a fascination all its own, but by definition it cannot last. What alternatives are there?

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27:33

Episode 6: Who is a Real Designer?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/07/28

In conversation with web developer Lucy Davies, who does not think of herself as a designer, despite lots of evidence to the contrary

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13:35

Podcast 05

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/07/11

Using words is a form of design. Writing and reading have a huge role to play in making life better.

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20:03

Episode 4: Packaging

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/07/02

Packaging is ubiquitous. For something so short-lived it nonetheless has an important job and consumes a lot of resources. In this episode, Kevin Drayton looks at the design and lifecycle of packaging, particularly relevant with the surge in internet shopping and concern with recycling and plastics. What is your relationship with packaging? Have you a considered attitude to the stuff or is it just an inevitable part of consumer culture?

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15:33

Episode 3: Only Connect

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/07/01

Design often asks us to reconcile what initially may seem to be antithetical requirements. Architecture in particular needs to blend art and science, intuition and analysis, emotion and logic. But the proposition holds true in all design to varying degrees. In this episode Kevin Drayton references E M Forster's much-quoted line: "Only connect the prose and the passion" as shorthand for this aspect of design

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24:32

Episode 2: What is Good Design?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/07/01

What criteria are used now, and have been used in the past, to judge design? Do these vary from one sector of design to another, or are they universally applicable?

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15:31

Episode 1: What is Design?

Make Life Better. By Design ·

2025/06/30

Design can mean different things to different people. Here Kevin Drayton sets out what he means by design and sets the agenda for future episodes. Whether we realise it or not, we are all designers of one kind or another!

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Make Life Better. By Design

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