Three firms from across the globe are setting new standards of design by paying homage to the past while also channeling a modern yet refined elegance. Here, their founders share how their projects tell a story of sophistication and style.
MAED. Collective
After 14 years as Yabu Pushelberg, Corinne Huard was ready to carve out her own space in the design industry. “I wanted to support the talented artists that create aspirational spaces and destinations while protecting individuality,” she says. Huard founded MAED. Collective in 2017, which boasts a portfolio that includes the Moxy Sydney Airport, Six Senses properties in Belize and the Galapagos, and a dozen commercial residential projects in the firm’s hometown of Toronto.
Secret to Success
Over the last 20 years in the industry, she learned that it was okay to not have all the answers but to work to find solutions. Her time there solidified Huard’s love for the industry. “Interior design is all about possibilities,” she says, “breaking conventions and creating new worlds and experiences to engage all senses.” In this business, she adds, it’s important to find a balance between dreams and reality “though it sometimes requires a change of perspective.”
Design Mentor
Huard points to designer Anda Andrei as someone who inspires her and is the ultimate example of a successful woman in the industry. “She is insanely talented, has amazing instincts, and exudes artistic genius and integrity,” she says. “When I met her at the opening of the Public Hotel in Chicago many lifetimes ago, I was more than influenced, I was energized and driven to make an imprint in this forever transforming industry. Her story warrants repeating.”

Moxy Sydney Airport
Big Break
Despite unprecedented challenges like the pandemic, the firm’s first hotel project, the Moxy Sydney Airport, opened last August. “It was a Covid project and yet the client was as invested as we were in its success,” she points out. “They became a friend and de facto member of MAED. Collective. We will forever be bonded by this project.”
Firm Ethos
“The Collective is passionate about diving deep in history and location,” Huard says. “Establishing a sense of place and identity is imperative to the creative process.”
Midwest Common
Michael Haener and Colin Tury first met while working at Shinola Detroit, the former as a design director, the latter as an industrial designer. After three years of collaboration, the pair decided to go out on their own, and so, Midwest Common was born in 2019. The locally based studio recently opened the Mexico City-inspired restaurant Vecino in Detroit’s Midtown, highlighting their rich yet refined aesthetic. It also marked the first project under the new Midwest Hospitality banner, which aims to bring global influences to the city’s hospitality market.
Early Influences
Haener points to the Detroit music scene in the late ’90s and early aughts as a major influence on him. “My first design jobs were doing rave flyers and record sleeves for my friends in the industry,” he says. “I used to trade design services for records and entry into the best parties.”
While in grad school Tury found inspiration from conceptual art and fell in love with Dutch artist Mark Manders. “His enigmatic, surreal sculptures speak to time and language while still maintaining a high level of craft and materiality,” Tury adds.”

The forthcoming Selene café and bar, shown in a rendering
Working Together
When the duo first starting working together, they found that their skill sets aligned. “It was clear we had a great foundation to do something unique in Detroit,” says Haener. Today, their “pretty seamless” working relationship, says Haener, has made the transition to business owners easy. Indeed, they have been meticulous about the studio’s growth focusing on quality over quantity. “We both have faults and superpowers,” he adds, “but we have each other’s backs. There’s nothing we can’t overcome.”
Midwest Style
The firm’s philosophy is anchored in minimalism. “Although every inch of an interior is considered, being able to sit within a design and edit moments that don’t add value or show intention is an important part of our process,” adds Tury. That lines up with the dream project, a hotel with an innovative F&B component. “The exciting challenge lies in our capacity to influence an entire space on that scale by maintaining a coherent narrative and highlighting our firm’s interests,” says Haener
Studio Writers

Jeongmi Lee, Kyoungcheol Hyun, and Younglae Kim
Having worked in and around the service industry throughout his career, Younglae Kim is sensitive to the physically and emotionally consuming work that goes on behind the scenes. After majoring in culinary art and food service management at Kyung-Hee University in Seoul, his goal became to create more comfortable environments for those workers, specifically focusing on efficiency and stronger service delivery. In 2017, he founded Studio Writers, his firm that is dedicated to weaving interesting narratives throughout interior spaces.
Firm Philosophy
“We dwell on the idea of ‘continuing’ something,” Kim says, “of connecting the past to the present and the present to the future. We plan projects with the hope of helping our works breathe with the future generation.” Indeed, one of the first steps Kim takes is identifying qualities that are uniquely Korean and expressing them within the design. Kim says he looks for the “beauty that we often don’t recognize.”

Naro restaurant; photo by Kiwoong Hong
Favorite Project
In 2021, Studio Writers was tapped by real estate company Tishman Speyer to design Naro as part of the restaurant overhaul within Rockefeller Center in New York. To create an authentic Korean experience, Kim “wanted to step away from simply replicating traditional Korean motifs while still retaining the story they symbolize,” he says. “We reinterpreted Korean beauty to inspire New Yorkers with the joy that comes from Korean aesthetics.”
Celebrating Heritage
Kim says he has “always felt a strong attraction to the Korean perspective and identity cultivated over time.” Because of that, the projects that Studio Writers designs show the world who they through a lens that is “pivotal to the Korean narrative and how they’ll be seen in the future.”