Keith Gerchak joins the podcast to talk about the double life he's been living for thirty years: designing spaces for storytelling as the Design Principal at TheatreDNA, and inhabiting those spaces as an actor and filmmaker. We explore what makes performing arts buildings unlike any other building type, the surprising parallels between directing a feature film and managing an architecture project, and how technology — from Revit to AI — can either serve a story or quietly strip it of meaning.

This episode is especially relevant for architects and design technologists who feel the tension between the tools they use every day and the purpose those tools are meant to serve. Keith makes the case quietly and specifically — drawing from three decades of bespoke theater design and a twelve-year independent film that made it into 500 theaters nationwide — that knowing why a building exists, and for whom, is the one thing no technology gets to replace.

To learn more about Keith Gerchak, see the full show notes with links at https://trxl.co/230

To get more great conversations with AEC technology leaders on the TRXL podcast please visit https://trxl.co

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AVAIL

AVAIL's content management system (CMS) simplifies access to your firm's content in one easy-to-use platform. Search and access files from anywhere, create standards-compliant models, streamline documentation, and onboard new hires faster. Try AVAIL for free and request a demo at https://getavail.com

Confluence Events & Podcast

Join AEC industry technology leaders at Confluence, a series of in-person events and a podcast fostering conversations between firms and tech companies to support innovation. Learn more, explore upcoming events, and listen to podcast episodes at https://confluence.getavail.com

TRXL+ Membership

This episode of TRXL is brought to you by TRXL+ members! Join our community of supporters to get exclusive benefits like ad-free episodes and full access to our AEC Leadership Edge newsletter. Your support keeps these valuable conversations going. Learn more at https://www.trxl.co/#/portal/signup/

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Sign up to become a TRXL member.

• Free members get email notifications when new episodes are released and when new posts are published on TRXL.co
• Paid supporters of TRXL+ get ad-free podcast episodes, full show notes, and exclusive Leadership Edge email newsletters from TRXL

In this special Campfire Series episode, Jeff Mottle joins the podcast to tell us the full story of CGarchitect — from a side project launched in 2001 to a 21-year platform, a sale to Chaos Group, and everything in between: the 3D Awards, CGschool, the evolution of archviz from expert-only technical gatekeeping to storytelling, and what COVID revealed when it stripped away all the travel and in-person events that had been keeping him going. We also get into his four years at NVIDIA, the AI wave he'd been predicting for nearly a decade before it hit, and why the AEC industry's instinct to wait for a clear winner may be the costliest mistake it makes.

This episode is especially relevant for visualization professionals, design technologists, and firm leaders watching AI reshape the tools they've built careers around. Jeff makes a direct case that the democratization of archviz didn't start with AI — the last 5% just got sped up — and he's specific about why billing by the hour is the industry's biggest liability going forward and what a shift to outcome-based pricing actually looks like.

To learn more about Jeff Mottle, see the full show notes with links at https://trxl.co/229

To get more great conversations with AEC technology leaders on the TRXL podcast please visit https://trxl.co

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Episode Sponsors:

AVAIL

AVAIL's content management system (CMS) simplifies access to your firm's content in one easy-to-use platform. Search and access files from anywhere, create standards-compliant models, streamline documentation, and onboard new hires faster. Try AVAIL for free and request a demo at https://getavail.com

Confluence Events & Podcast

Join AEC industry technology leaders at Confluence, a series of in-person events and a podcast fostering conversations between firms and tech companies to support innovation. Learn more, explore upcoming events, and listen to podcast episodes at https://confluence.getavail.com

TRXL+ Membership

This episode of TRXL is brought to you by TRXL+ members! Join our community of supporters to get exclusive benefits like ad-free episodes and full access to our AEC Leadership Edge newsletter. Your support keeps these valuable conversations going. Learn more at https://www.trxl.co/#/portal/signup/

-----

Sign up to become a TRXL member.

• Free members get email notifications when new episodes are released and when new posts are published on TRXL.co
• Paid supporters of TRXL+ get ad-free podcast episodes, full show notes, and exclusive Leadership Edge email newsletters from TRXL

Steve Burrows CBE joins the podcast to talk about why the construction industry keeps rewarding dysfunction instead of fixing it. We explore the gap between selling time and creating value, why startups keep failing to change construction by trying to change all of it at once, and what the collapse of Katerra actually taught the people who were in the room when it happened.

This episode is especially relevant for firm leaders and engineers who feel trapped in the cycle of meetings, emails, and change orders, and who suspect the system they're operating in was never designed to produce great work. Steve makes a blunt, practical case for starting with what you can control, and his perspective is shaped by decades of working on some of the most complex structures in the world before walking away from the corporate path to figure out what comes next.

To learn more about Steve Burrows CBE, see the full show notes with links at https://trxl.co/228

To get more great conversations with AEC technology leaders on the TRXL podcast please visit https://trxl.co

_____

Episode Sponsors:

AVAIL

AVAIL's content management system (CMS) simplifies access to your firm's content in one easy-to-use platform. Search and access files from anywhere, create standards-compliant models, streamline documentation, and onboard new hires faster. Try AVAIL for free and request a demo at https://getavail.com

Confluence Events & Podcast

Join AEC industry technology leaders at Confluence, a series of in-person events and a podcast fostering conversations between firms and tech companies to support innovation. Learn more, explore upcoming events, and listen to podcast episodes at https://confluence.getavail.com

TRXL+ Membership

This episode of TRXL is brought to you by TRXL+ members! Join our community of supporters to get exclusive benefits like ad-free episodes and full access to our AEC Leadership Edge newsletter. Your support keeps these valuable conversations going. Learn more at https://www.trxl.co/#/portal/signup/

-----

Sign up to become a TRXL member.

• Free members get email notifications when new episodes are released and when new posts are published on TRXL.co
• Paid supporters of TRXL+ get ad-free podcast episodes, full show notes, and exclusive Leadership Edge email newsletters from TRXL