Inside AD PRO Design Dialogues 2026, AD's Design Summit

See the full agenda from AD PRO Design Dialogues hereNothing was going to keep architect Elizabeth Graziolo from her date with AD PRO last week—not even a fractured knee. On September 16, the founder and principal of Yellow House Architects arrived at One World Trade Center on crutches for the inaugural AD PRO Design Dialogues, AD’s day-long design summit at One World Trade Center. The previous weekend, while visiting family in Toronto, she revealed, she had been struck by an e-bike. “I delayed my surgery until next week so I could make it here!” she said of the panel discussion she was headlining alongside architect Michael K. Chen. “I wouldn’t have missed this for the world.”She wasn’t alone. AD PRO Directory members flew in from Phoenix, Chicago, Miami and beyond for the full day of expert panels and networking, while plenty more tuned into the livestream. The talks—featuring such top talents as Heidi Caillier, Corey Damen Jenkins, and Stephen Kent Johnson, were honest, practical, and refreshingly unfiltered; topics included how to build, promote, and scale a design business; the freshest approaches to color; powerful kitchen technologies; and how AD editors decide what gets published. “Pulling the curtain away was really helpful,” said architect Tana Nesbitt-Hayes of New York’s Studio8 Architect, an AD PRO Directory member since 2024. Eyeing her own studio’s growth, Nesbitt-Hayes said she hung onto every word of Caillier's conversation with AD’s Global Interiors and Garden Director Alison Levasseur, where the AD100 designer revealed how she works with a fully remote staff.AD's Alison Levasseur, AD100 designer Heidi Caillier, and AD's Amy Astley Building and maintaining relationships was a consistent theme across the day, including off stage, when AD’s editors joined attendees for lunch at the Conde Nast cafeteria. Architect Lauren Schlesinger of Glickman Schlesinger and Jeffrey Ramirez, brand designer of The Up Studio, discussed real estate development. At another table, designers Amanda Hickam, Manon Roux, Rebecca Roberts, and Shani Core shared advice on the latest apps and cameras for measuring projects’ as-built conditions, while across the room photographer Haris Kenjar, AD100 designer Leyden Lewis, and architect Erik Peterson swapped industry intel.“There is something incredibly powerful about getting talented, creative people together and allowing conversations to happen organically,” said Hickam, founder of Birmingham, Alabama–based interiors studio Harper Harris Design.AD's Michael Shome, photographer Stephen Kent Johnson, AD's Bebe Howorth, and AD's Mayer Rus AD's Sam Cochran, Sherwin-Williams's Sue Wadden, and AD100 designer Corey Damen Jenkins AD’s Global Editorial Director and US Editor in Chief, Amy Astley closed out the day’s panels with a keynote conversation with AD100 Hall of Fame talent Kelly Wearstler, who diverted a trip to Europe to attend AD’s event. Wearstler spoke candidly about her strategy to managing her company’s six creative verticals, her stumbles on her path to success, and how she continues to look for new inspiration while planning for the future.After a day forging new connections—and catching up with old friends—the day wrapped over rooftop cocktails for all attendees at the elegant Andrée Putman Studio townhouse downtown.AD PRO Design Dialogues took place September 26, 2026