Architectural critic Charles Jencks once said that a building should speak - that it should express meaning and emotion, surprise and humour, and reflect the values of the culture it sits within. Step inside The Cosmic House, and you’ll find a home that does exactly that.

In this episode, Danielle visits one of London’s most astonishing hidden gems: The Cosmic House in Holland Park, the former home of the late Charles Jencks and his then wife, the landscape designer Maggie Keswick. Designed between 1978 and 1983, the house is a maximalist, multi-layered essay in built form - every inch of it embedded with symbolism, references to cosmology, art history, and post-modern thought. There’s an upside-down dome, a Solar Stair, and a Cosmic Oval: this is not your typical Victorian townhouse.

Danielle is joined by Eszter Steierhoffer, Director of the Jencks Foundation and former Senior Curator at the Design Museum, who walks her through this truly unique building and the mind behind it. Together, they discuss Jencks’ radical approach to architecture, his belief in “radical eclecticism” and his support of Maggie’s Centres for cancer patients following Maggie’s death in 1995, as well as the legacy he left behind - not just in the bricks and geometry of his home, but in his writing, his gardens, and his intergalactic thinking.

Part museum, part manifesto, The Cosmic House remains almost exactly as it was when the Jencks' lived there, and is now open to the public as a site of critical experimentation and creative response. Tune in to discover the legacy of one of architecture’s most original thinkers, and hear how the house continues to inspire artists, architects and visitors alike.

The Cosmic House

Artist Pam Glick is the quintessential gritty New York artist. Born in Albany and raised partly on an aristocrat's estate in England, she spent her rebellious teen years smoking pot and hitchhiking in search of Woody Guthrie while her glamorous laissez-faire parents imbued her with the confidence and optimism that has seen her through the many chapters in her extraordinary life, including living and working in New York - where she would hang out in cafes chatting to the likes of Quentin Crisp, and where she had a basement studio next to Richard Prince - to raising kids, divorce and surviving cancer.

Through it all, she has never stopped creating. Known for her instinctive use of colour and emotionally resonant abstraction, Glick studied Painting at the Rhode Island School of Design, where she received the Florence\ Leif Award, and later earned her MFA from the University of Buffalo. Her work was widely shown throughout the 1980s and 1990s, with solo exhibitions in New York and Los Angeles. Her paintings have also featured in group exhibitions at Pat Hearn Gallery, the Drawing Center, and the Buffalo AKG Art Museum. More recently, she has held solo exhibitions at White Columns (2016) and The Journal Gallery, New York (2021). For this conversation, Danielle Radojcin met Pam at the Maruani Mercier gallery in Brussels, which is holding an exhibition of her work.

Dive into the world of Tom Wesselmann - both a defining figure in American Pop Art and an outlier within it.

Known for his bold, humorous, and unabashedly sexual work, Wesselmann explored desire through iconic series like Great American Nudes, his close-up depictions of female mouths, his larger-than-life still lifes, and his lesser known but no less striking penis paintings. First exhibited in New York in the 1970s, these works push his signature flat, abstract style into deeply personal territory. They also invite reflection on the male gaze, eroticism, and how his art is perceived today.

Joining host Danielle Radojcin to discuss Wesselmann’s legacy is Jeffrey Sturges, director of The Estate of Tom Wesselmann. Having worked closely with the artist in his studio and home during the 1980s, Sturges offers a rare, firsthand perspective—not just on Wesselmann’s work, but on the man himself.

Recorded at Almine Rech gallery in London, where Wesselmann’s penis paintings and other works are on view until 12 April 2025, this conversation unpacks the wit, provocation, and enduring impact of this fascinating artist.

Photo: Portrait of Tom Wesselmann, 1969 (detail)

© 2024 The Estate of Tom Wesselmann / Artists

Rights Society (ARS), New York - Courtesy of the Estate and Almine Rech. Photo: Jack Mitchell