Roman Mars is the host of the wildly popular design podcast “99% Invisible” and has been called “the Ira Glass of design.” With several hundred episodes in the can over its six years in existence, it’s covered everything from “Unsung Icons of Soviet Design” to Love Park’s place in skateboarding history to DIY space suits, all through the same lens of – as he says – “telling stories that make you notice and appreciate the world in a different way,” drawing attention to the world of design around us that is 99% invisible (hence the title of the show). He’s also the creator of the world’s most popular design-focused TED Talk and co-founder of the podcast collective Radiotopia.
Today on the podcast,
- He says that “lack of success gives you a certain amount of freedom.” I love this because I see so many people stressing about the fact that they aren’t a household name yet – embrace it! This is your chance to try crazy, cool stuff – and if you mess it up then it doesn’t matter because nobody’s watching.
- We get into something I talked about recently on this show which is finding your personal style — he has a great way of putting it: try on as many things as possible until you find your voice.
- He gets into what he’s learned as the show has scaled and relies not just on him but on a team. This is tough for many creators who are super comfortable doing things alone and have to make a lot of adjustments once it becomes a team effort.
Enjoy!
Know where to put your worry
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Some Questions I Ask:
- What work do you think you’re doing with your podcast, 99% Invisible? [1:10]
- How did you get to where you are, telling factual stories about the world in an interesting way? [1:30]
- Do you remember the first show you did? [3:06]
- The show is so well produced; is it because of your radio background? [4:54]
- How do you think about the work that you do in creative terms? [7:46]
- Do you make an attempt to consider every decision in your work? [10:35]
- How do you get a personal style? [12:36]
- Talk to me about the creative gap and the struggle where happy accidents happen. [14:53]
- How do you think about being a hyphen and taking on so many different roles and wearing so many different hats? [16:27]
- What are some times where things have gone wrong? [22:13]
- How do you get people to care about visual topics with radio? For example, how would you talk about your boots? [25:20]
- What would you tell people who want to do what you do? [28:19]
- What is something that if you told people about yourself they’d be surprised to know? [30:16]
- Were you in a punk band? [32:12]
- Do you have any characters from the punk era? [33:31]
- Are you trying to reinvent your show every time you do a show? [35:20]
- Do you have any habits that you attribute to success and longevity? [38:00]
- When was the last time you gave a long form interview like this? [42:40]
In This Episode, You Will Learn:
- How Roman got his start in telling interesting stories that make you notice and appreciate the world in a different way. [1:45]
- What Radiophonic means to Roman, and how it differentiates a written story to what sounds great on the radio. [5:21]
- What it means to Roman to do your job right as a radio producer. [7:00]
- How Roman uses design awareness to think about the world’s problems. [8:13]
- How Roman applies a hard work ethic to getting creative. [8:55]
- Why Roman doesn’t bother futzing over every detail. [12:06]
- Stealing+lack of talent=creativity. [12:56]
- What Ira Glass might suggest you do if you asked him how to develop your own style. [13:24]
- Why Roman likes being a producer, wearing many hats and solving different problems than he used to. [16:40]
- The progression of Roman’s love for radio and podcasting. [18:35]
- What you should do if you want to get into radio or podcasting; find a job where you have to do everything. [20:45]
- The one place you can find joy in an airport; at the shoeshine. [27:30]
- How Roman uses the influence of punk rock to structure his business and personal mindset. [32:20]
- “All art should be this balance between comfort and challenge.” [34:40]
- Roman’s remedy for migraines. [38:54]
- Where to put your worry. [40:50]
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