Designing for Belonging: How Space Influences How We Lead with Rachael Grochowski

Welcome to the Wisdom of Women Show.

We are dedicated to amplifying the voice and wimp of women in business.

A new model of leadership is emerging and we are here to amplify the voices of women leading the way.

I am your host Coco Salman, five time founder, impact investor and creator of the Force for Good system.

Thank you for joining us today as we illuminate the path to unlocking opportunities and prosperity for women led enterprises by amplifying the voice and wisdom of women.

Today we have a presence building architect in our midst.

Rachel Grosky is the Founder and CEO of RHG Architecture and Design and the creator of the Design is Spiritual Philosophy, an approach that treats spaces as engines of well being, presence and belonging, not just aesthetics.

With 30 years of experience across residential, hospitality, wellness and community projects, she leads her award winning studio in crafting environments that feel grounded, inclusive and deeply human through intentional flow, materiality, light and connection to nature.

Today she is a sought after public speaker and an advocate for wellness centered design through the Global Wellness Institute's architecture and design ecosystem.

Rachel brings the rare blend of builder, wisdom seeker, world traveler, yoga teacher, student of history and nature in her repertoire.

She brings us to every project and leadership lesson.

Welcome Rachel.

Thank you so much Coco.

I appreciate the introduction.

That was really rich and feels like.

I feel honored we need more of honoring one another in this world.

I'm so delighted to meet you.

We had the opportunity to meet a few months ago.

We spoke to a group of young women entrepreneurs at Montclair University in New Jersey.

We sat next to each other and answered questions on resilience and and leadership.

I knew I needed to invite you, Rachel, to be here on Wisdom of Women.

I'm happy that you're here.

So as, as we get started, I always like to ask what is a book written by a woman that has significantly influenced your life?

So I love this question.

As I was thinking about my answer, one of the first things that hit me was the frustration of how few books are written by women and how many are written by men.

It actually took me a little bit of time and then I landed on something this morning I changed my mind about a book that has profoundly changed me and actually it's written by my yoga teacher, Sean Korn, who is international yoga leader and with Yoga for Trauma and Social Justice.

Her book is called Evolution of the Soul.

The reason it was so profound for me Is that I work to live my life through the lens of yoga.

And the book is really her journey of how she saw her life through the lens of yoga and how yoga can open you up to seeing things, help you develop resilience, how you see yourself, the reflection of your own strengths and weaknesses, the shadow and the light, and really be present in current time.

Beautiful.

I love this.

What richness, you know, seeing your life through the lens of yoga.

One of the things that's remarkable about you and your business is the way that you have really built your business through the lens of yoga.

I think that's why you're so successful.

I can't wait to dive into that.

Before we do that though.

I always like to start with getting to know you as a human and looking back on your life.

Can you share with us three moments of of your life experience that have shaped the human being that you are?

These could be moments where you stood up, moments you broke down, moments when someone surprised you or grace fell upon you.

Share with us three moments that have shaped the person you are proud to be today.

The first moment that pops into my head is being in nature.

When I was a small child, I was originally born in Wisconsin.

I grew up in Colorado, but my grandparents had a cottage on a lake.

I can still feel the air on my skin and hear the sound of my footsteps as I would run down the dock and jump in the water.

Those moments really formed my connection to nature and my awareness of that connection.

A second moment that was triggered by your introduction of the question is a little more dramatic.

When I was in high school, there was a girl who lived around the corner from me.

She was neurodivergent and I remember she was walking home from school one day and these boys in a car were following her and harassing her.

I was also a teenager and I stepped out into the street, started yelling at these boys my own age to leave her alone, and kind of stepped into in to do my best to be a ally and stand up for the protection of someone who probably dealt with that a lot.

That was pretty profound, I think.

It's something I think about, but it came to my memory, as you said.

It does have something to do with why I am so focused on social justice and equality and being an ally where I can.

The third one might be this realization that once I became an architect and maybe they're all tied together in some way.

I think they probably are.

I was working for a very well known AD100 firm and doing just the most beautiful High end work and felt really empty.

Felt like I was creating beauty but not reverence.

I really struggled.

I considered leaving the industry because it didn't feel like I was in my purpose.

What was I giving back?

Who was it accessible to?

That's something I still struggle with at times, which is, you know, we talk about more later.

But why I choose the type of projects that I do.

So those would be the three moments.

Wow.

I love how you described being a child and remembering the way the air felt on your skin and the feeling of your feet as you were making your way on the dock to the water.

I love lakes.

And how profound that you were able to make that visceral connection so early on when you told this story about the neurodivergent girl, you.

You really opened up my heart.

We need more bravery in our lives, and we need it to come out of ourselves.

I wondered as you were telling the story, was it something that you just couldn't help yourself?

It was just an impulse.

Did you think about it?

Were you scared?

How did you feel in that moment when you were standing up for this young person?

I don't think I thought about it.

Yeah, I think it was visceral.

It's not the last time that I did something like that.

Sometimes, quite frankly, to my own danger, the gift in there for me is not filtering.

Oh, maybe this isn't safe for me.

Sometimes the protection of others should come before our own need for safety.

Even if it's not your child, your parent, or someone you love, to me, part of humanity.

We need that in business.

We need that fundamentally in the way we create prosperity for ourselves and for others.

And when that's missing, there's beauty, but no reverence.

That's powerful.

I'm gonna have to meditate on that.

For a lot of the women founders on my show, the difference.

We want for our businesses to create reverence, to have meaning and purpose.

If it's just functional and there is no reverie, there's no transformation, there's no elevation, there's no, you know, deeper rising, the tide.

It.

It's just not that interesting.

It's flat.

It's why women leaders are so important.

So tell us, what is this idea behind Design is spiritual.

So design spiritual.

It's interesting because the sequence of your questions is leading me down the path, which I'm sure is intentional.

But beautifully.

Design is spiritual, is everything we've already talked about.

Right?

Like, it is a process of engaging in design.

And it's actually not just design.

It's Also practice.

We are looking to engage the senses, engage the purpose of the spaces we're creating for the individuals we are creating them for.

We have like 12 different objectives or goals or cues is maybe a better word because not every project hits 12 of those.

And I tried to not be terribly formulaic because Even putting those 12 cues together was a little difficult for me because it's very.

There's a lot of energy exchange in the process of design, or at least the way that I and our team, myself and my team design.

And it becomes about understanding the history of place, which could be the history of a family business, that reverence for what that means.

It's thinking about the wellness and well being of the individuals through materiality.

You could say sustainability.

I tend to lean towards regenerative, but it's healthy materials, it's nature, it's biophilia, it's about community.

It's asking questions about if we're working, family, home, you know, what is time together look like.

So you might, you know, some families, when they're together, might be doing a puzzle.

One person's in the corner reading a book, another person is doing some research and another person might be cooking.

And that's togetherness.

It's individual to each family.

And it might change over time, but those are things that are really important.

We go through this trajectory to understand and then to craft.

We weave in wisdom traditions into.

Maybe it's a floor plan, maybe it's the land, or maybe it's the dialogue talking about the energy.

We actually, I just had that situation where a client, we had actually come up with a floor plan kind of based on these principles.

A little bit of time lagged in between and between construction and that layout, that design.

And the client came back and this is an existing house and said, I really want a door here.

I want it in this location.

I said, listen, I disagree.

The reason I disagree is it's very poor Feng shui and it doesn't support like, I know you now well enough to know that, like, you're building your legacy, you're building your family wealth, you're building the history, the future for your children.

And this space is going to be used for not just your home, but when you have fundraising events, the family is very interested in supporting nonprofits and different efforts.

And I was like, this is just not the place to have a door because all the energy is just going to be lost.

It's not held.

And I said, it's really about the feng shui.

And you know, he said, I do care about that.

I hear what you're saying for myself.

I have to go research it now.

About two hours later, I got an email back saying, I get it now.

I totally understand feng shui.

That completely makes sense.

So I love listening to everything you're saying.

What I notice is how powerful this construct of design can be put into so many different contexts.

The idea of design and practice, you're creating space, and then what happens in the space to the yoga piece?

What are the practices that create the things you want to have in your story?

And I'm thinking about some of my listeners who are founders.

When you are creating your business space, all the spaces, the virtual spaces, the physical spaces, the places that your customers come, and whether it's again, virtual or physical, your team, where they work and in what spaces, how they work together, all of that design matters.

Especially when we're working with the retail client or hospitality client.

And talking about that is, first of all, that whole the energy process and the design of the experience.

From the moment that your customer steps out of their car or off of the public transit, like whatever, that work puts their hand on the door, that's the beginning.

Thinking through the spiritual and the process aspects starts.

Then it needs to go not just into what their experience is, but what your.

Your staff's experience is.

The way you organize elements in your space, and that might be functional elements and it might be esthetic elements.

Right?

And it's kind of why I use the word regenerative to some extent, because I think regenerative is not just your space, the materials you use, its economy, it's collaboration, it's reverence, understanding of the earth and its gifts, and it's about being in present time, returning to this collective.

Businesses that see themselves as this collective, integrated, not just with each other and their customers, but a larger field, do feel purpose and are more successful and ultimately have a different feeling when you experience that completely.

Right?

We've all had that experience, or we've been in a home where we really can regenerate, where we can feel beauty, we can take a deep breath and feel it in our heart, the calm.

And we can feel the love we have for our families, our children, or our team members, or just fellow man if we're out in the world.

This is why I was so fascinated about bringing you and your wisdom to the conversation, because you've built a remarkable company that supports and sustains you and your family.

You have prosperity for your clients, and it can work.

Talk to us a little bit about this.

Talk to us about how you've made this a fundamental piece of your recipe for growth, for customers, for success in whatever way you wanna.

That's a funny word to me, but.

Success, Well, I think it's an evolution, right?

Our lives, our businesses, our families continuously evolve in that evolution.

There are certain things I commit to and keep going back to one of the things, and I just wrote this down because I was remembering it from a couple of years ago.

It was like something I.

In the studio, I'll often talk about my personal philosophies, kind of trying to share it with everybody.

When you start to see that work is love in action, you can stay focused.

It's always about coming back to center.

All of us have moments where we're like a kid in the candy store and we have, you know, I'm sure most people are, especially entrepreneurs, have a million different ideas every day.

Can sometimes drive my administrative marketing and leadership.

The design.

I'm very narrow.

I have an idea and I can stay on it.

But when I'm thinking about how I want to be perceived and how I want to feel, there's so many avenues to share that I can sometimes go in lots of different directions.

And you always have to come back to center going in a million different directions from like, oh, that's interesting, that person's doing it this way.

Or look at that project.

That's pretty brilliant.

Why haven't I done anything like that yet?

Coming back to the center of who am I and what really means something to me.

Even when I talk about wellness projects, it's interesting because over my career I've done lots of spas, yoga studios, fitness studios, lots of wellness type spaces.

I recently realized coming back to center that wellness that's.

It's so much bigger than that.

And I shouldn't say I recently realized this.

Like, every time you realize something, you actually already knew that.

Right.

Do you have that experience too?

Totally.

Of course.

Yes.

It's like, of course this is true.

But it's hitting me like a ton of bricks again.

Right?

Yeah.

Some of our projects that I find the most rewarding are not that design savvy.

Like, we worked on a grain mill.

That is the client is working towards rebuilding native grains in.

In western New Jersey.

And she's working with a miller.

She was developing this grain mill.

It's.

And it's pretty functional.

I mean, it's cute.

It's also got a retail store and it's creating a whole community hub.

But is so rewarding because now more and More farms.

Instead of growing native grains, which are being milled in this grain mill, which are now providing grain and wheat, different types of grains, to even restaurants in New York City, much less around the rest of the state.

And so it's actually like healing the land.

Wow, that's amazing.

To be involved in a project that goes back to the root of the three things that changed my life.

Moments that changed my life.

Right.

Like nature.

Nature, Right.

One of the things that strikes me about you, and I know you've.

You've owned your company since you've been doing this for a long time.

As you build a company, every founder I know, including myself, when you're first getting started, you want to take anybody who will pay you.

Over time, I have gotten better at being more clear about who I can best serve.

I'd love for you to talk about your journey because you are working with clients that enrich you.

You enrich them, you attract them.

You might turn down projects.

Can you talk about that and how that's actually made your company stronger?

Yeah.

There are still days I question, should I take this project or not?

Right.

Sometimes we take project I'm not sure about, and it turns out to be a gift.

For whatever reason, I said yes.

I'm always trying to stay open to that, who is right and who maybe isn't going to support our mission.

It really comes down to clarity of the message.

I've been talking about design spiritual.

Like, you know, my business has been around for, I guess, 22 years now.

I was always talking about energy.

I was always talking about nature.

I was always talking about the way you feel in your body.

But now that I have spoke in the words design and spiritual, I can use that as a filter with clients.

Clarity with yourself.

That that can be like, again, I just had a potential project interview with a residential client.

Because we have such a broad range of project types, we recently redid our website, and it really starts with what design spiritual is.

Right.

And.

And we've noticed that most people don't get off first page.

They don't even go into the portfolio, which I find really interesting because this residential client basically found us, not through word of mouth, but ended up on our website and saw our.

Our values and our mission and was like, that's what I want.

And so I think it's.

I think it is.

You know, I think maybe when we were on the panel together, I might have mentioned that when I first started talking about design spiritual, people were like, shh.

Yeah, you shouldn't say that out Loud like that, you're going to scare away clients.

Yeah.

You know, and I think when you're new in business, I get it, because you need to sustain yourself, but once you've been around a while, it's.

It's kind of like take it or leave it.

I actually would rather not have a project that isn't in alignment because I can't fulfill their dreams.

They don't have necessarily have to understand, but they have to want to understand.

Yeah.

And that is coming back to purpose, mission and values.

If you can't create the transformation that's in your promise as a company, then it's not a win.

Even if you exchange money, it just isn't a win.

I think that is one of those lessons that when we follow that when we use the words that are most accurate and even, you know, people don't like them, some people won't, and other people will be deeply attracted.

And our real brand, our real story.

If we build environments as a mirror for what we believe, what beliefs do you think founders must release to scale their.

Their companies create prosperity?

What beliefs must they practice until they become, you know, what can they do?

How can they use their environment as a mirror or growth?

And how can they use their.

How can they reset their environments to help them break through.

Study the environment.

So how do they focus on.

And of course, you can see my back desk has a bunch of papers on it.

So this is maybe not the best example, but I do think it's like editing.

I was talking about this the other day.

I actually had another podcast the other day, and I was saying that sometimes our space can be too constrained and sometimes it can be too abundant.

You have to find the middle ground or meet yourself where you're at.

I was talking about how as an architect, you're taught to be very rigid and linear.

We're in a moment where we're softening.

Even if the whole industry is looking at curves and color, trying to get back to ephemeral idea, it is about writing yourself.

And so in your.

In your business environment, you need to find that softness, but also with clarity.

Right.

And that's esthetically right.

And it depends what your business is.

Right.

If your business is a wellness space, you're probably not going to have a lot of clutter.

You're going to have lots of curves and textures.

But if you're, if you're.

And maybe that's true even if you have a law office.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yes.

What do you want to tell your client in school?

They Would say it's a bank.

You need it to be stable and you've got to do this and this or maybe nurturing maybe.

It needs to feel like a wellness space even though it's a bank.

Right?

Yeah.

Isn't money financial wellness?

Right.

You have to start questioning how do I want my.

What does this space feel like?

And is it in alignment with not what society says it's supposed to be what I feel like it should be what I want.

I think it's always about creating the environment that you want, not that you think other people want.

And that helps as a practice?

Yes.

Ritual is really, really important.

My personal rituals are, you know, in the morning, I get up pretty early, I have my gratitude journal, then do a little bit of reading.

I've got stacks of books all over the place.

I slip in a few minutes of meditation, and if it's possible, I go outside for at least five minutes.

It depends on the time of year.

Sometimes I light a candle, like anyway, just different things, kind of adjusts a little bit.

But it's really that ritual that's setting me up for the day is really helped me grow my business, stay in my lane, keep all the noise out, remind myself of my purpose.

And I think that helps businesses grow.

It's easy to create your mission, but if you don't follow your mission, which a lot of us don't always, I've had people say to me, you write your mission and then you put it in a drawer and you never look at it again, well, then maybe you need to change the mission.

Or how do I embody that mission?

One of the things you said that I want to go a little further on.

I love that you talked about practice at the beginning and brought it up again now.

And the word ritual.

With founders I work with, I talk about creating rituals daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual rituals.

Companies do this stuff all the time, but they're dry.

Not rituals, they're meetings.

And they don't have deeper meaning and they don't have mission or purpose woven necessarily into them.

And when you were talking about how you talk to your team about your beliefs and philosophy, you are taking time to create space for them to understand what design is spiritual means.

Can you talk to us a little bit about how you do that with your team and what that looks like?

I like to have KPIs connected to values and purpose because people do stuff that is part of their ritual, part of what they're reflecting upon.

So I'd love for you to talk about how you Teach your philosophy to your team?

Absolutely.

Lots of different ways.

And again, it's partially.

Somebody from the outside might say it seems inconsistent, but it's really an evolution.

And so many times on Monday mornings we go through all of our projects and oftentimes I'll start with like, I was sharing something about what I was reading either over the weekend or in the morning, and a reflection I had.

Some days of the week I go for a walk before work and I think one of the recent things I shared was, oh, I walked around the park the opposite way.

Isn't it interesting when you start to look at things differently?

And what does that mean?

I was talking about that in the studio, about how that applies to design.

There's not just one path.

Right.

So maybe when you start the project, you start looking at it from all the different sides, then maybe you come up with a different solution.

Right.

So I share stories.

I also ask them to share stories.

Yeah.

So this doesn't happen at all the meetings, but it may be quarterly.

Either I'll send out some questions before the meeting, or sometimes to their probably shock and horror, I'll like, ask a question on unexpected about, like, tell me a moment where you have a real clear memory of a place and a moment and share that with us.

Part of that is trying to get them in their body and to understand that what we're trying to do is create sensation.

And when you are aware of the sensations in your body, that's how we start to understand when we feel good and not good.

Right.

Or angry or happy, comfort, safe or not safe.

And that's super important in architecture and design and the other things that I will do.

I actually have a couple of sound instruments in the office.

So I have a singing bowl.

And if I feel the energy in the office is tense, maybe we have a deadline.

I will start playing the singing bowl.

Or if I just got a.

My office has a glass wall.

And if I'm on a tense conversation with a contractor or something and I know they can all hear me at the end of it, I'll gong the singing bowl to break the energy.

Right.

To shift it so people know, like, okay, that's that.

We've got a tuning fork in the conference room.

I also try to create experiences of wellness for the team.

We recently have a nonprofit park close by.

It's a garden.

We did a tour of the garden, walked through different areas, talked about the history of the place, the family, the development.

And then at the end of it, kind of sat and had lunch together.

And talked about moments in nature and how they were profound.

Everybody's story was so vastly different.

It's an exchange.

It's not one sided.

It's not always just me talking because it doesn't always land.

One of my teachers used to say, or a lot of her teachers will say, you will.

They could say the same thing in class every week and all of a sudden you heard it and now it's meaningful to you.

I have to invite them into their own experience and ask them to share that with me.

I learned from them too, of course.

That is so wise and so brilliant.

Thank you for sharing that, really.

Because it is a purpose led initiative, business organization, embodied.

I appreciate your sharing all of that.

So I'd love to move now to our Fast Fire round.

I have five questions for you, Rachel.

I invite you to come from whatever shows up.

Five questions, short answers, five words or less.

This helps us get to know you in a more specific way.

What is one material you love?

And because it feels alive.

I love very organic, expressive wood that is plain sawn.

You can see the cathedral, the grain.

Beautiful.

What are you craving most right now?

Morning sun.

What sound instantly tells you a space is working?

What sound?

It's all stillness.

Stillness.

What is a tiny ritual you use to reset when you feel over stimulated or off center?

Singing.

Go.

Beautiful.

Finish this sentence.

Design is spiritual because.

Because it's who we are.

Yeah.

I love this.

I love, love, love this.

I thank you so much for all this.

How can our listeners and viewers learn more about you, your company and your wisdom?

Thanks for asking.

We're on Instagram @rhdesign and our website, which has the 12 different cues right there on the homepage is rhjdesign.com and then we also have this available deck of cards called Design Spiritual cards.

And there's 52 in there.

There are 52 bits of wisdom related to design and presence.

They're available off our Instagram.

Wonderful.

I'll pull the link and put it in the show notes.

That's so cool.

And a way for us to embody the wisdom you're sharing with your clients.

I know sometimes you're out in the community and you speak publicly.

I'm hoping I can get you to come into New York one of these days and speak to our founders here.

We'll stay in touch, Rachel.

Absolutely.

A gift and a blessing to be with you.

Thank you for sharing your wisdom today on the Wisdom of Women Show.

Thank you, Rachel, for illuminating the path to unlocking opportunities and growth and prosperity.

For us all.

I value your wisdom and appreciate you, you and to all of our world changing listeners out there.

Be sure to follow like and share the wisdom of women.

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