Beyond the Buzzword
I’ve always been drawn to the question of how things could work better. It began in architecture — sketching buildings, rethinking how people move, meet, and create together. Over time, that same curiosity shifted from physical spaces to systems, teams, and decisions. I realised that innovation isn’t about what we build, but how we think while building it.
The word innovation gets thrown around so easily that it often loses its meaning. I’ve seen companies set up “innovation teams” with great energy, only to bury them under process and politics. They treat creativity as a special project instead of a way of operating. And yet, we keep using the word because it captures something essential: the drive to progress, to imagine what could be better.
From a designer’s perspective, innovation is really a translation process. It happens when curiosity meets constraint — when ideas are tested, shaped, and refined until they create real value for someone. Designers do this instinctively: prototype, learn, adjust, repeat. The same rhythm applies to business and leadership. Innovation, in that sense, is design applied to everything, from products and places to culture and decision-making.
In my career leading real estate strategy and innovation, I’ve seen this pattern play out again and again. A small change in how teams collaborate can unlock more creativity than a million-dollar redesign. A well-framed question can shift an entire project’s direction. Innovation rarely starts with technology. It starts with curiosity, and with the willingness to unlearn what no longer works.
That belief became the seed for Wireframes. It began as a personal lab, a space to document and became a platform to explore how design, business, and strategy can evolve together. Innovation, to us, isn’t a department or a slogan. It’s a conversation between imagination and reality. It starts with asking better questions, experimenting in small ways, and creating systems that help ideas grow instead of fade.
In the end, innovation isn’t about being first. It’s about being attuned: noticing what’s shifting, what people need, and what might be possible next.
