Why Material Intelligence Matters at NeoCon and Chicago Design Week 2026 with Jon Strassner and Kenn Busch

About this episode

The episode discusses the importance of material intelligence in commercial interiors as Chicago Design Week 2026 approaches.

As Chicago Design Week 2026 approaches, the conversation around commercial interiors is expanding beyond product launches and showroom trends at NeoCon and Design Days to focus more deeply on the materials that shape our built environments. In this episode of I Hear Design, host Robert Nieminen welcomes back Kenn Busch of Material Intelligence and welcomes Jon Strassner, founder of ReWritten and host of Once Upon a Planet, for a timely discussion about materiality, sustainability storytelling, and circular design. Together, they preview what attendees can expect from Destination NeoCon and the ReWritten pop-up, while unpacking why designers, specifiers, and manufacturers need to ask better questions about what products are made of, where they come from, how they perform, and what happens at the end of their useful life. The conversation explores embodied carbon, material transparency, supply chain accountability, certifications, circularity, remanufacturing, reuse, product take-back programs, and the challenge of making sustainability feel accessible rather than overwhelming. Busch and Strassner also explain why storytelling may be one of the most powerful tools the design…

People in this episode

Host: Robert Nieminen

Guests: Kenn Busch, Jon Strassner

Topics covered

• material intelligence
• sustainability
• circular design
• commercial interiors
• design trends
• material transparency

Keywords

• materiality
• sustainability storytelling
• embodied carbon
• supply chain accountability
• product take-back programs

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Material Intelligence, ReWritten

Books & works: Once Upon a Planet

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