Variant Thinkers -> Variance Podcast
Hi everyone,
In a world saturated with hot takes and ephemeral news, I’ve been searching for conversations with more staying power. I wanted to create a space to explore the kind of fresh, original thinking that truly pushes our world forward.
That's why I'm thrilled to announce the launch of my new podcast, co-created with Jake Kraft, Variance.
Our Mission:
Variance is a podcast dedicated to spotlighting the vanguard of young talent—creators and thinkers who are excelling at the frontiers of their fields, from science, engineering, and AI to art, architecture, design, literature, and entrepreneurship. Our mission is to share the stories, variant insights, and journeys of these young innovators to inspire and expose listeners to truly original thinking.
The goal is to go beyond résumés and achievements. We’re curating conversations with guests who are not just brilliant, but also have a high degree of intellectual variance—people you might call quirky, weird, or non-conventional, who are just plain fun to talk to because they see the world from a unique angle.
In our episodes, we’ll dive deep into the heart of their creativity. What motivated them to act, think, and see differently? Where did they get the inspiration to make novel things? We will intentionally avoid ephemeral news and instead focus on the deeper philosophies, mental models, and creative processes that will make these conversations feel fresh and insightful a decade, or even 50 years, from now.
This is a personal passion project, not a new career. Our focus will be on quality over quantity, with 6 to 8 high-quality episodes published a year.
Our First Episode: A Conversation with Dan Spiegel of SAW Architects
To kick things off, our first episode features a conversation with Dan Spiegel, an architect and co-founder of the award-winning firm Spiegel Aihara Workshop (SAW). Dan is the perfect embodiment of what Variance is all about. He operates at the nexus of architecture, landscape, and public policy, challenging the very boundaries that typically define those fields. His work is driven by a search for "productive tension," where buildings and landscapes are not just complementary but are designed to be the same evolving entity. This is an architect who designs for unpredictability, creating frameworks that allow a place to emerge organically over decades rather than being frozen in time.
Our conversation explores the variant mind behind this philosophy. We dive into his speculative projects that tackle major urban challenges—like a proposal for collective housing that literally bridges property lines to fight the affordability crisis—and his built work, like a low-cost "prefabrication hybrid" home in Maui designed as an adaptable prototype. We don't just talk about buildings; we discuss the unconventional mental models and first principles he uses to solve problems, revealing a way of thinking that is essential for anyone interested in how creative and divergent minds see the world.
I invite you to listen to our debut and subscribe on your preferred platform. I'm incredibly excited to build this platform for young voices and share their journeys with you. If you like the first episode, please leave a star rating. If you didn’t like it or want something different, drop us a note (we really care)!
Website: variancepod.com
Apple Podcasts: Listen on Apple Podcasts
Spotify: Listen on Spotify
Hope you enjoy the conversation.
Arun & Jake
arun@variancepod.com
jake@variancepod.com
