Amy Seo grew up with an engineer dad who fixed everything in the house and she liked making things. Shahar Cohen grew up pulling computers apart, piece by piece, and made a sculpture out of rubbish for her high school major work.

They went straight from university to setting up architecture practice Second Edition, delivering a growing body of work characterised by real care and rigour in the reuse of building demolition materials, alongside beautiful design and entrepreneurial flair.

In doing so, they’ve become one of the more prominent Sydney voices in a movement that’s moving incredibly fast from the radical fringe to the absolute mainstream of construction and design. Of course, I had to find out more! 

Having fallen in love with The Sound of Music and never wanting it to end, Kerri Glasscock packed her bags at 15 and moved away from her family and her tiny country town to make a play for the theatre. She performed and put on shows and started the classic 505 jazz and theatre venues - rated in the top 150 jazz clubs worldwide by Downbeat - as well as turning the The Sydney Fringe into one of the most adventurous slots on the city’s calendar. Along the way, she emerged as a key change agent for Sydney's culture, advocating for reform, leading the review of the state’s culture policy - and this year taking the helm of Create NSW, the state’s creative agency. Kerri has an instagram grid full of extraordinary cakes, a magnetic personality and she’s larger than life - of course, I’ve always wanted to know more, and this conversation more than delivered. 

Philip Thalis has been described as an influencer for a better future. As one of Australia's most respected architects, he’s literally shaped the physical environment of Sydney. In being awarded the Australian Institute of Architects’ highest honour - the Gold Medal - he was described as a role model for the architect as a public intellectual. Through his research, teaching, his magisterial tome Public Sydney and his persistent advocacy, he’s changed the way we think about our city - I’m constantly challenged to look at the city differently by the care and affection in his social media posts. So, of course, I’ve always wanted to know more!

Amanda Tattersall is a community organiser, author and researcher. She was a founder of GetUp, the Sydney Alliance and Labor for Refugees, and she makes the excellent Changemakers podcast, too. Amanda’s prolific and undeniably deeply creative in her impact, and she’s also become a powerful voice in the still far too taboo space of mental health and the way our brains work. Despite all that, she’s far from a household name, so, of course, I’ve always wanted to know more.    

Ebony Wightman doesn’t like the term ‘trigger warning’ because it can stop people from talking about lived experience.

This deeply insightful conversation uncovers a whole life’s worth of experiences from the dark depths of loneliness, poverty and attempting to take her life through to the joy of creativity, community and expressing yourself.

Her work has been shown across Sydney from the Hawkesbury and Blacktown to the Biennale and Art Gallery of NSW, and her advocacy is driving real policy change.

In short, she’s doing the work of changing our city’s culture, and I’ve always wanted to know more. 

Caroline Butler-Bowdon - universally known as CBB - has been a curator and a museum director, a PhD researcher, a government leader with a track record of significant change and she’s now the State Librarian.

She’s one of those people who seem to attract good people into their orbit, who become a centre of gravity all their own.

I see these people and the buzz of activity that forms around them, and especially with CBB, I’ve always wanted to know more.

Danièle Hromek is at the centre of an incredible moment. Creative, entrepreneurial, full of ideas, she’s right in the centre of a profound shift that’s underway towards a growing appreciation of Country, and of connecting and designing with Country, and it’s changing the way we think about and plan our cities. What I love about her work is the fluid way she works across so many domains - built urban environments, theatre and art, culture. I’ve seen her name pop up in so many different places, and I’ve always wanted to know more about the person behind all that work.

James Bradley grew up a couple of streets back from the beach, and it never let him go. Despite stints selling newspapers in a pub and working in a video shop, as a judge’s associate and a solicitor, it’s his career as a writer that’s given voice to that deep and abiding love and fascination with the ocean. With 10 books to his name and at least as many awards, his latest epic story is that of the ocean itself. It was a joy to sit down and hear how it came to be.

Cath Dwyer is a radio maker and journalist who’s helped shape the culture of radio here. A former Young Journalist of the Year and Human Rights medal winner, she founded the ABC’s pioneering participatory journalism project ABC Open, and has worked in radio at all levels from community stations through to Radio National and Triple J. At a time when the role of public media is more contested than ever, I loved getting the opportunity to talk to someone who knows it inside and out. 

Brooke Webb is larger than life. From sneaking in to a Nirvana gig through a broken window (and landing right on the stage, in front of Dave Grohl’s massive right calf), to touring Sonic Youth. Running away to join the circus through to her current gig as Chief Executive of the Sydney Writers Festival. She’s lived a hundred different lives and relished every one. You often hear cliches about life being a journey, Brooke’s life is an adventure that criss crosses time zones and continents.