Few people are better positioned to speak to the meaning of home than Amy Astley. As global editorial director and editor-in-chief of Architectural Digest, she has spent the past decade both documenting some of the world’s most remarkable residences and helping turn the home itself into a major form of mass cultural content, whether through the magazine’s residential design coverage or its viral Open Door video series. Along the way, she’s not only influenced which people and projects enter the design canon, but expanded the publication to new digital formats, changing how audiences discover architecture and interiors, and overseen the globalization of coverage across the brand. “I don’t even describe AD as a magazine,” she says. “It’s a universe.” On the most recent episode of California Closets’ Ideas of Order Podcast, Astley offers reflections on design from a more personal vantage point, beyond the polished interiors and celebrity home tours that have become central to AD’s identity.

Storytelling has been the throughline in all of Astley’s endeavours, from her early days as a ballet dancer, then as an English major in college, her first job as an assistant at House and Garden Magazine and, later, working under Anna Wintour at Vogue. “It’s all saying, ‘Yes.’ Taking on more, more, more, more. Which is always a piece of my career advice to people. They don’t have to take it, but I’m always like, if there’s more to do, you should do it,” she says.

It was at Vogue that Astley honed an “obsession” with personal style, which has driven how she has approached AD’s design coverage. When it comes to what makes a home worthy of being featured on the magazine’s pages, “What I really want to see is deep, personal meaning,” she says. “You can’t fake it. It’s hard to bottle up, but it’s something poetic. You know it when you see it. It’s rare.”

For Astley, the personal remains at the heart of exceptional design journalism. “I think that’s what I’ve brought to AD is the importance of the person in the house… Because in the end, I think you remember how a house makes you feel and who’s living in it more than you remember things like sofas or window treatments or fabric choices,” she explains. “I think those things are only memorable for professionals.”

Over her decade-long tenure at AD, she’s also witnessed seismic industry shifts firsthand. “I started 10 years ago, and people were actually quite closed to new ideas and new people and [it was] very hard for young people to break in,” she recalls. “And that’s not a sign of a thriving industry.” She argues that while experience and longevity are especially valuable in architecture and design, where costs are high and mistakes expensive, the industry cannot thrive if it remains closed to emerging talent. Making space for younger practitioners, she says, is essential to keeping the field healthy and evolving.

Tune in to the full conversation with Amy Astley at surroundpodcasts.com, californiaclosets.com/podcast/ or wherever you get your podcasts.