Room to Think

Lyssia Katan
  • 5.0 (3)
  • Design

Room to Think explores how the spaces we live and work in shape how we think, feel, and function.Hosted by Lyssia Katan, Head of Brand at LiLi Tile, the podcast features conversations with world-class architects, designers, neuroscientists, psychologists, and cultural thinkers. Together, they unpack how light, layout, materials, sound, and spatial decisions influence stress, focus, creativity, and wellbeing, and share practical insights you can apply in your own home or workspace.New episodes drop on Tuesdays. Follow Room to Think on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

  1. 1h ago

    How Trauma Shaped Our Cities

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with architect, researcher, and author Ann Sussman to explore how the spaces around us shape the way we feel, move, and behave, often before we are consciously aware of it. Drawing from her work in cognitive architecture, neuroscience, and eye tracking, Ann looks at what our brains are actually responding to when we experience a building, a street, or a city. The conversation explores the idea that humans may be far more instinctive than we realize. Ann explains why our brains are naturally drawn to faces, contrast, color, and certain visual patterns, and how tools like eye tracking can reveal what captures our attention within the first few seconds of entering a space. She also looks at why industries like technology, advertising, and automotive design have become so sophisticated at understanding human emotion while architecture has been slower to embrace the same science. They take the conversation deeper into one of Ann’s most provocative ideas: the connection between war, trauma, and the rise of modern architecture. Ann explores how the destruction of World War I and World War II created an urgent need to rebuild, and how the personal experiences of architects who lived through war may have influenced the buildings and cities that followed. They ask what happens when design is shaped during periods of enormous disruption—and how much of that legacy we may still be living with today. Lyssia and Ann also examine the health consequences of the environments we have built. From highways and car-dependent neighborhoods to narrow sidewalks and places where walking has become difficult or unsafe, Ann argues that architecture is not simply about the buildings themselves. It is also about whether we can walk to a café, whether children can bike to school, whether older adults can remain independent, and whether our surroundings support the way human bodies were designed to move. The conversation moves into walkability, longevity, stress, social connection, public transportation, and the difference between places built around people and places built around cars. Ann points to cities like Paris and Copenhagen as examples of environments that increasingly prioritize pedestrians, bicycles, and everyday human interaction, while asking what American cities may need to rethink as the population ages. Ann also shares the work of the Human Architecture + Planning Institute, a nonprofit focused on understanding the human experience of the built environment through education and research, including eye-tracking and biometric studies. Its courses bring together neuroscience, psychology, architecture, and design to better understand how people actually experience the places around them. By the end of this episode, you may start looking at the built environment differently and asking a bigger question: if our surroundings are constantly shaping our nervous systems, our behavior, and even our health, why are we still designing as though they are only something to look at? More Room to Think: Ann Sussman / Human Architecture + Planning Institute Website: https://www.thehapi.org/ HAPI Courses: https://geneticsofdesign.com/2026/07/30/looking-for-a-happy-summer-check-out-these-hapi-courses-bridging-the-arts-sciences/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T13cAmFcHHc Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    How Trauma Shaped Our Cities

  2. Oct 13

    What Rome Got Right

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with architect, leadership coach, and best-selling author Diane Van Buren to explore what Rome can teach us about beauty, architecture, and the way we live today. Drawing from her years living in Rome and her background in architecture, Diane looks at why the city’s piazzas, fountains, public spaces, and handcrafted details still feel so powerful centuries later. The conversation explores what the Romans understood about human scale, belonging, beauty, and civic life. Diane explains why piazzas act as “people magnets,” why pedestrian spaces can feel more restorative, and why public beauty can do more than simply decorate a city. She also talks about the way Roman architecture communicated permanence, power, luxury, and identity, and why those ideas still shape how we experience buildings today. They take the conversation deeper into some of Rome’s most enduring design lessons, including the Pantheon and the engineering behind its unreinforced concrete dome. Diane explains how Roman concrete was designed to strengthen over time and why the craftsmanship, proportion, and durability of ancient buildings continue to stand in such sharp contrast to much of what we build now. Lyssia and Diane also explore what may have been lost along the way. From the decline of ornamentation and handmade detail to the rise of car-centered cities, repetitive materials, and buildings designed around speed and efficiency, they look at how modern spaces can become disconnected from the people who actually use them. The conversation also moves into fountains, sculpture, public art, craftsmanship, city squares, and the role beauty can play in everyday life. Diane explains why spending time in thoughtful public spaces can create room to slow down, observe, process, and reconnect, and why beauty does not have to be grand or expensive to have an impact. By the end of this episode, you may start looking at the places around you differently and asking a bigger question: if Rome got so much right about how people gather, move, and experience beauty, what have we forgotten about how to build? More Room to Think: Diane Van Buren LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurel-diane-van-buren-14698315/ Website: https://thrivingvisionaries.com/ Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    What Rome Got Right

  3. Oct 6

    Beneath the Beauty

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with Elizabeth and Rich Landry, the husband-and-wife team behind Kensington Design House, to explore what may be hiding beneath the surface of a beautiful home. Bringing together Elizabeth’s background in psychology and science-informed design with Rich’s architectural perspective, they look at the ways our homes can quietly affect our health, stress levels, habits, and everyday lives. The conversation explores why a home can look beautiful and still work against you. Elizabeth and Rich explain how clutter, poor lighting, awkward layouts, lack of connection to nature, and everyday points of friction can shape the way we feel without us always realizing why. They also discuss the idea that we often adapt ourselves to our homes instead of asking whether our homes should be adapting to us. They take the conversation deeper into some of the parts of the home we rarely think about, including indoor air quality and HVAC systems. Rich explains why the air moving through most residential HVAC systems is largely recirculated rather than fresh outdoor air, why filters need more attention than many homeowners realize, and how poor ventilation, humidity, pollutants, and improper maintenance can create problems that may be completely invisible. Elizabeth and Rich also break down their Home Environment Study, which looks beyond aesthetics to evaluate how a space is actually performing. From lighting levels and air quality to circulation, comfort, clutter, and emotional response, they explain why understanding what is happening in a home can help uncover problems we may have simply learned to live with. The conversation also moves into biophilic design, texture, materials, natural light, aging in place, and the small changes that can make a home feel dramatically different without requiring a full renovation. Sometimes the answer is not more square footage or more furniture, but a better layout, fewer obstacles, more intentional light, or simply paying attention to where friction shows up in your daily routine. By the end of this episode, you may start looking past how your home appears and paying closer attention to how it actually makes you feel, function, and live. More Room to Think: Kensington Design House Website: https://www.kensingtondesignhouse.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kensington.designhouse Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    Beneath the Beauty

  4. Sep 29

    Designing for Quiet

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with Julian Treasure, leading expert on sound, communication, and the power of listening, to explore something most of us rarely think about: how the sounds around us shape the way we feel, focus, communicate, and live. Julian explains why sound deserves just as much attention in design as color, texture, lighting, and layout. We may stop consciously noticing the hum of an HVAC system, traffic outside the window, or conversations happening around us, but that doesn’t necessarily mean our brains have stopped processing them. He breaks down why the human voice is one of the most distracting sounds, why open-plan offices can make it harder to concentrate, and why the spaces we spend our time in are often designed for the eyes while largely ignoring the ears. The conversation also explores the hidden effects of living in an increasingly noisy world. Julian discusses how noise can affect sleep, stress, productivity, hearing, and health, and why restaurants, offices, schools, and even our homes can become louder than we realize. They also discuss whether noise-canceling headphones are really a solution, why natural sounds like birdsong can help create a better environment, and what architects and designers can do to make spaces more acoustically comfortable. Most importantly, this episode offers a practical way to start listening to your own space. Julian shares a simple exercise for evaluating any room by asking three questions: Is it healthy? Is it helpful? And does it make me happy? From quieter appliances and better acoustic treatments to curtains, ceilings, and the sounds we choose to surround ourselves with, small changes can completely shift the experience of a room. Because sometimes the biggest problem in a space isn’t what you see. It’s what you hear. More Room to Think: Julian Treasure Website: https://www.juliantreasure.com/ Communication Skills Assessment: https://studio.com/apps/juliantreasure/mcc?ref=juliantreasure&code=a The Listening Society: https://www.thelisteningsociety.community/ Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    Designing for Quiet

  5. Sep 22

    The Aesthetic Brain

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with Dr. Anjan Chatterjee, neurologist, cognitive neuroscientist, and founding director of the Penn Center for Neuroaesthetics at the University of Pennsylvania, to explore what actually happens in the brain when we experience beauty—and why some spaces simply feel better than others. Dr. Chatterjee breaks down the science of neuroaesthetics and explains how our brains respond to people, places, art, architecture, and the environments around us. He introduces the aesthetic triad—the sensory, emotional, and meaning-based systems that shape what we find beautiful—and explains why beauty is far more personal than we may realize. What feels calming, interesting, or inviting to one person can feel completely different to another depending on memory, culture, experience, and personality. The conversation also explores the three qualities Dr. Chatterjee’s research has identified in our experience of space: coherence, fascination, and hominess. They discuss why some rooms immediately draw us in, why others overwhelm us, and what actually makes a space feel like home. Dr. Chatterjee also explains how ceiling height, curves, openness, noise, and even the layout of an environment can influence the way we feel and behave, often without us consciously noticing it. Most importantly, this episode offers a different way to think about design. Rather than following a trend or trying to create a universally “beautiful” room, Dr. Chatterjee encourages us to pay closer attention to our own reactions. How does this space make me feel? Do I want to stay here? Does it feel comfortable, interesting, or overwhelming? Because when it comes to the spaces around us, the brain may be responding long before we ever put that feeling into words. More Room to Think: Dr. Anjan Chatterjee + Penn Center for Neuroaesthetics Penn Center for Neuroaesthetics: https://neuroaesthetics.med.upenn.edu/ Psychology Today — Brain, Behavior, and Beauty: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brain-behavior-and-beauty LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anjan-chatterjee-4131734 Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    The Aesthetic Brain

  6. Sep 15

    From Curb to Counter

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with Dan D’Agostino, founder and principal architect of Plan Architecture, to explore what it really means to design a custom home. Working across architecture and interiors, Dan has built his practice around a “curb to counter” approach, thinking through everything from how a house sits on the land to how someone moves through the kitchen, and his work asks a deceptively simple question: what if your home was designed around the way you actually live? The conversation centers on why true customization goes far beyond choosing finishes, adding square footage, or pulling inspiration from Pinterest. Dan explains why his process starts with more personal questions: how do you want to feel when you pull into your driveway? What do you want guests to think when they walk through the front door? Do you want to wake up with the sun? How far are you willing to walk from your bed to the bathroom at night? For Dan, these details are not small at all. They are the foundation of a home that feels specific to the person living in it. Dan also shares why designing a home can start to feel a lot like therapy. From separate bedrooms and bathrooms to a three-story slide, he explains why the best custom projects happen when clients are honest about what they want, even when those requests are unconventional. The conversation also looks at how social media and AI are changing the design process, why inspiration images can sometimes make homes less original, and why a beautiful AI rendering can still fail when it meets the realities of structure, light, code, and daily life. By the end of this episode, you may realize that the real luxury in a custom home is not having more space or more expensive finishes. It is having a home that understands you. More Room to Think: Plan Architecture Website: https://www.plnarc.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/planarchitecture Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    From Curb to Counter

  7. Sep 8

    Home By Horoscope

    In this episode, Lyssia sits down with astrologer Anthony Perrotta, founder of AP Astrology, to explore the surprising connection between astrology and the spaces we live in. With a background in fashion, interior design, marketing, and more than 16 years of studying astrology, Anthony looks at birth charts not as fortune-telling, but as a way to understand patterns, preferences, and the environments that may feel most natural to us. The conversation breaks down what a birth chart can actually reveal about the way we live. Anthony explains why the sun sign is only one small part of the picture, and how the moon, rising sign, Venus, elemental balance, and even the fourth house can offer clues about comfort, aesthetics, color, materials, and the way we experience home. They also explore why some people are instinctively drawn to certain textures, objects, layouts, and design styles without always knowing why. Anthony also takes Lyssia through all 12 zodiac signs and shares what each might need from a space, from the boldness and natural light of Aries to the softness of Taurus, the flexibility of Gemini, the nostalgia of Cancer, the drama of Scorpio, and the sensory, artistic nature of Pisces. Along the way, they talk about why trends can sometimes pull us away from our own taste, how astrology can be used as a tool for more personal design decisions, and why your moon sign may be one of the best places to start if you want your home to feel more like you. The conversation also moves beyond interiors into Mercury retrograde, eclipses, Saturn returns, trend forecasting, and the idea that astrology may be more useful as an anticipatory tool than a predictive one. Anthony explains why astrology should not be something that makes us feel powerless, but something we can choose to work with while still keeping our own agency firmly intact. By the end of this episode, you may start looking at your home a little differently—and wondering how much of your design style was written in the stars all along. More Room to Think: Anthony Perrotta Website / Readings: https://www.perrotta.co/bookings Substack: https://anthonyperrotta.substack.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ap_astrology/ Cosmic Reflections Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Cosmic-Reflections-Astrological-Intentions-Everyday/dp/157863945X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=9NKQEAYXTF41&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.RmUHvnDvHdQQUie02kr1PUSNPtlx-abgl2JAEgdvOKu_Uv4CHyB9-JmJdUF4PbpAxfaDKDKy8Repc8JyS-KvmeAAWTJyW9idmKxIIFSxmJU.-EmFbiIcagZlJNSiWkg15lgJzpeLqS1Hv37q9MxLH9w&dib_tag=se&keywords=anthony%2Bperrotta&qid=1784914341&sprefix=anthony%2Bperrott%2Caps%2C200&sr=8-1 Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/cosmic-reflections-anthony-perrotta/1150439587?ean=9781578639458 Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    Home By Horoscope

  8. Sep 1

    Light Is A Drug

    In the first episode of season two, Lyssia sits down with Dr. Mariana Figueiro, director of the Light and Health Research Center at Mount Sinai and one of the leading researchers in light and human health, to explore how light shapes far more than what we see. Originally trained as an architect, Dr. Figueiro has spent her career studying how light affects our circadian rhythms, sleep, mood, alertness, and long-term health, and her work asks a simple, overlooked question: what if the light in your home is quietly working against you? The conversation centers on why Dr. Figueiro describes light almost like a drug. Like medication, she explains, light needs a dose, a timing, and a regularity to work in your favor, and getting the timing wrong can disrupt sleep just as easily as the right timing improves it. They break down what that means in practice: how much light the eye actually needs, why the first hour after waking matters most, and why dimming the hours before bed matters nearly as much as brightening the ones after. Dr. Figueiro also shares what years of applied research have shown, from redesigning lighting aboard US Navy submarines to help sailors sleep and stay alert on shift, to her long-running work in nursing homes, where increasing daytime light improved mood, reduced agitation, and lowered fall rates in patients with Alzheimer's disease. The conversation also pushes back on a few popular assumptions: why blue light glasses and screen filters are often oversold, why a dim room can look bright enough to fool your eyes while doing nothing for your body clock, and why red light seems to work more like a cup of coffee than a sleep aid. By the end of this episode, you may realize that better sleep has less to do with what you do right before bed and more to do with the light you let in hours before you even think about it. More Room to Think: Dr. Mariana Figueiro LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mariana-figueiro-694632150/ Light and Health Research Center at Mount Sinai: https://icahn.mssm.edu/research/light-health LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/light-and-health-research-center-mount-sinai/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Light.and.Health.Research.Center.Mount.Sinai X: https://x.com/LightSinai/ Room to Think https://roomtothinkpodcast.com/ Loved this episode? Let us know! Subscribe to Room to Think If you enjoyed this episode, leave a review and share it with someone who would appreciate a more thoughtful approach to their space. New episodes every week. Build a better life by design. Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Instagram

    Light Is A Drug
See All (42)

Trailer

Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
3 Ratings

About

Room to Think explores how the spaces we live and work in shape how we think, feel, and function.Hosted by Lyssia Katan, Head of Brand at LiLi Tile, the podcast features conversations with world-class architects, designers, neuroscientists, psychologists, and cultural thinkers. Together, they unpack how light, layout, materials, sound, and spatial decisions influence stress, focus, creativity, and wellbeing, and share practical insights you can apply in your own home or workspace.New episodes drop on Tuesdays. Follow Room to Think on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Information

  • Creator
    Lyssia Katan
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    42
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Room to Think
  • Show Website
    Room to Think

You Might Also Like