In talking to interior designers, retailers and others in the home furnishings industry, it’s clear that people are curious about how artificial intelligence will shape their businesses and careers in the years to come. Some are scared; some excited. But many have yet to delve in.
San Francisco-based interior designer Regan Baker’s thoughts on AI seem typical. She recently told us that her team at Regan Baker Design isn’t using AI tools in any formal or substantive way yet. But, she says, “I think (AI) is going to be a huge component for us in the future. I think it’s going to be transformative.”
Podcasts are a great way to delve into new subjects, providing an easy opportunity to learn while driving to a client meeting, working out or hanging on the beach this summer.
Here are five recent episodes that may inspire you to get started with AI tools for everything from idea generation to image creation to client communications.
* “Where to Get Started With AI for Interior Design” from “AI for Interior Designers,” hosted by interior designer Jenna Gaidusek (about 35 minutes). The episode title pretty much says it all: Gaidusek walks listeners through getting started with ChatGPT for client communications, social media posts, design inspiration, project management, trend analysis and customer support. Check out other “AI for Interior Designers” episodes here.
* “How Should I Be Using AI Right Now?” from “The Ezra Klein Show,” hosted by New York Times columnist Ezra Klein (about 75 minutes). As Klein says in the episode’s show notes: “It’s clear we’re witnessing the advent of a wildly powerful technology, one that could transform the economy and the way we think about art and creativity and the value of human work itself. At the same time, I can’t for the life of me figure out how to use it in my own day-to-day job.” So, Klein chatted with Ethan Mollick, a professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, who shares his experiences spending countless hours experimenting with various chatbots. The episode is full of tips for choosing chatbots and techniques for making the “relationship” with a bot most fruitful.
* “Create Stunning and Engaging Graphics Aligned With Company Branding and Campaign Style Guides: Master AI Visual Assets” from “Leveraging AI,” hosted by Isar Meitis (about 60 minutes). Ignore the long episode name. In this podcast, digital marketing and AI imagery expert Drew Brucker shares practical tips for mastering Midjourney, a leading AI image-generation tool. The episode focuses on branding graphics, but the strategies and ideas apply more broadly to using AI image tools.
* “How to Leverage AI for SEO” from “Everyday AI,” hosted by Jordan Wilson (about 30 minutes). Wilson talks with Steve Toth, the founder of SEO Notebook, about striking a balance between human-generated and AI-generated content and gives specific tips for using AI to develop and tweak web content for better search engine optimization.
* “More Mind-Blowing AI Tools for Creatives” from “AI for Creatives,” hosted by Kamilah Sanders and Nova Lorraine (about 20 minutes). The hosts give a rundown of 11 AI tools that will improve your workflow and boost productivity — from AutoDraw, Google’s web-based tool that converts sketches to illustrations, to Chroma, which learns your color preferences to spark creativity and maintain brand consistency — plus others for art, video, photo and text editing. Check out other “AI for Creatives” episodes here.
