Meet Miranda Derossi

We recently connected with Miranda Derossi and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Miranda, you’ve got such an interesting story, but before we jump into that, let’s first talk about a topic near and dear to us – generosity. We think success, happiness and wellbeing depends on authentic generosity and empathy and so we’d love to hear about how you become such a generous person – where do you think your generosity comes from?

My generosity comes from gratitude. I am quite a sentimental person, and I’ve gathered over the years a collection of just about everything anyone’s ever given me that was handmade, or unexpected, or lovingly specific– anything from little sketches to letters and notes to plastic dinosaurs. These objects store for me the warmth and wonder of being thought of for no reason other than affection. Their presence in my daily space invites me to regularly remind myself of two things: the first, how much meaning it can provide (and how little material effort it often takes!) to communicate to someone how significant they are; and second, how when I am at times inclined to feel less gracious, I have a reserve of love shown to me to draw on and reflect back into the world.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

My focus as an artist is experiential design, which is broadly defined as a multidisciplinary approach to physical constructed environments that prioritizes human experience of the space. Disciplines such as wayfinding & signage, architecture, and exhibition & installation design contribute to and overlap with this field. I am particularly interested in experiential design as a form of narrative storytelling; my work most often centers around spaces and objects that hold and communicate personal meaning and ask audiences to imagine things as they could be, not just how they are. My work is designed to be immersive and interactive; those who engage with it are asked to place themselves as participants rather than witnesses, contributing to a broader act of collective creation and experience.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

The first that comes to mind is awareness. Learning how to deliberately tune in to my own experience of space, both physically and emotionally, has helped me redesign the spaces I live and work in to fit my needs and has given me a deeper understanding of how the spaces we inhabit shape our behavior. Curiosity is, in my opinion, a necessary next step; I ask questions voraciously and seek out their answers wherever I am. What am I seeing around me? What am I not seeing around me? How did the street I’m walking down develop, and why, and by whom, and for whom? Who was this space built to serve? My artistic practice of experiential design looks to use the information provided by awareness and curiosity towards what I consider to be the most important area: empathy. We can only intentionally and effectively construct human-centered environments that cultivate equity when we understand how and why they are not this way already.

What would you advise – going all in on your strengths or investing on areas where you aren’t as strong to be more well-rounded?

The kindest thing I could ever do for myself is take those shaky steps into areas where I am the weakest. I believe this quite strongly for many reasons, but the two perhaps most significant ones are the opportunity to learn and the development of trust in myself. While I love sharing about my own experiences when people are interested, I find it incredibly valuable to be the one listening rather than speaking. This ties in to the value of curiosity I expressed earlier; so much opens up for me when I absorb the world from the outside in. Exploring my areas of weakness has also taught me how much I can rely on myself, no matter the circumstances. I know I can hold my own in my areas of strength, but learning from experience that I can stumble as many times as I need to and still be okay is a different, more encompassing relationship to my own value.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://mirandaderossi.com