For Adelaide-based Studio Gram founders Graham Charbonneau and Dave Bickmore, two friends who met while studying architecture at the University of South Australia, being architects who take immense care in designing memorable spaces has always been a top priority. But as hard-working as they are in their collaborative studio, they stay true to integrating fun in the process — whether that's in the vibrant energy their projects reflect or in maintaining that important work-life balance.

For this week's Small Studio Snapshot, Charbonneau and Bickmore share what they've learned so far in running their growing practice, as well as their hopes for the future.

How many people are in your practice?

There are 6 people in our practice. Myself and Dave Bickmore as the two directors. Olivier Martin, Sam Broadbridge, René Majewski and Alistair Reeve.

Why were you originally motivated to start your own practice?-

We both had fathers who were self employed throughout our childhoods, and the work life balance they had was a motivating factor. We also wanted to be in creative control of what we were working on, whilst offering what we hope is a pleasant working environment to our employees.

Can you describe the atmosphere/culture of your office? 

We have a laid back atmosphere in the office. We like to have fun, we have music on all day, and generally can be found having a good time. We work hard, and sometimes long hours, so having fun is a key to keeping everyone happy—that isn’t to say we don’t take our jobs seriously, we just balance it all out. 

What hurdles have you come across? 

Our biggest hurdles have been around managing growth and deciding how we would like to scale the business. Dave and I both have strong passions for architecture and design, and we would like to maintain our ability to be involved in all aspects of all projects in our practice.

What is Australian design to you?

Australia's design sense is adventurous; we like to think it avoids clichés. It is exciting to be part of a design culture that is constantly trying to stay ahead of the curve.

What inspires and informs your design approach?

We are inspired by ‘faces and places’. We travel a lot, and use the experiences gained from travel, the people we meet, and the places we visit as inspiration for almost all of what we do. We endeavor to create experiences, not just ‘spaces’.

Is scaling up a goal or would you like to maintain the size of your practice?

Scaling up is certainly a goal, however we would like to cap it to ensure that we can still deliver the same quality of work that we continue to deliver today. We see ourselves growing to a maximum size of 10 at this stage. However, that number seems to change from year to year as we better learn how to deal with the growth of our practice.

What are the benefits of having your own practice? And staying small?

The opportunities to be in control of your work/life balance are great, and the opportunity to provide the same work/life balance to our employees. We also get to decide what kind of work we take on, what kind of work we turn down, and what kind of resources we put towards our projects. We are a design first kind of practice, and that is a decision we were able to make early on, and continue to implement on every project.

Staying small allows us to be hands on as directors. We get to work on every stage of every project in the office. After all, we studied architecture, not business management, and remaining as working architects is very important to us.