What does it mean to innovate? It could be to break new ground, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. But it could also be to re-tread old ground, revisiting ancient ways of doing things to keep them alive. Both approaches are hailed in this survey of 21 innovators across a variety of creative and lifestyle industries, in response to the question: who do you think is the most innovative person or company in your field right now?

Food and Drink

Josh Niland, chef and co-owner of Saint Peter

American fine diner Blue Hill at Stone Barns has always stood out because their curiosity extends far beyond cooking. They’ve shown that a restaurant can become a place for research, collaboration and agricultural progress, helping shape the future of ingredients rather than simply responding to what’s available. That’s the kind of innovation I admire most: work that leaves the industry fundamentally different from how they found it.

Mindy Woods, chef and native food advocate

Innovation isn’t always about creating something new. Sometimes it’s about reclaiming what was almost lost and carrying it forward in a way that inspires the next generation. Through Palawa Kipli, Kitana Mansell’s not simply serving food – she’s helping reclaim Tasmanian Aboriginal foodways, language, history and cultural identity.

Every meal, bush food experience and conversation becomes an act of truth-telling, reconnecting people to the original food systems of Lutruwita and reminding Australians that Aboriginal food is Australian food. Kitana represents a new generation of First Nations leaders, who understand that food is far more than nourishment. It is culture, memory, identity, sovereignty and a pathway back to Country. She honours the work of the generations before her while confidently creating new pathways for those who will follow.

As Indigenous chefs, we’re not just changing what’s on the plate – we’re changing the national conversation about whose stories are told through food. Kitana is leading that movement with authenticity, generosity and purpose. She is one of the most important innovators in Australia’s food industry today.

Dave Verheul, chef and co-owner of Embla, and founder of Saison Aperitifs 

For me, it’s the guys at Chinati Vergano, a generational vermouth and amari producer based in Asti, Italy. I really respect how they balance spice so beautifully. There's a wider industry misconception that spice should be used like a blunt hammer, and that wine quality is secondary – they don’t buy into either. They work with genuinely great wine producers, and you can taste that discipline in the final product. There’s also a nice story behind it: the original maker came from the perfume industry, and there’s a real perfumer's sensibility in how the botanicals are layered. Now his nephews carry that on.

I’m also a big fan of what Oliver Shorthouse is doing at Melbourne market garden Ramarro Farm. I don’t think there’s anyone doing as much as he is in bringing the spectrum of niche heirloom radicchio to the wider masses. Bring on the bitter!

Helly Raichura, chef-owner of Enter Via Laundry

I’m all for independent, female-led food businesses, and Gunjan Aylawadi is a strong leader, with clarity in her vision and offering. Flyover Fritterie is joy on a plate, capturing the nostalgia of the Indian diaspora effortlessly. I’ve been to the restaurant in Sydney and dream of returning.

Chefs with deep knowledge of their own heritage are often overlooked: to be taken seriously, we’re asked to reinvent, reclaim, modernise. There is no shortage of skilled Indian chefs with a wealth of traditional and nostalgic recipes, but because the industry often sees us as an exotic novelty or cheap takeaway, many young chefs are pushed towards reinventing their own food to attract interest.

Gunjan’s food is honest and untweaked. People from the diaspora breathe a sigh of relief when they find places like hers that transport us back home. She’s a role model for young chefs to cook instinctively with confidence, ignoring the gaze of food trends, awards and accolades that too often overlook diaspora diners and what we actually want when we choose to eat out.

Meg Brodtmann, winemaker, educator and Australia’s first female master of wine 

In Australia’s very white, male-dominated wine industry, the charity Women and Revolution champions all women, non-binary people and those with a trans experience or history. They are still quite Sydney-based and I would like to see their events and outreach extend to other cities.

Andy Miller, co-founder of Heaps Normal

Heaps Gay founder Kat Dopper has spent more than a decade making Sydney a better city to go out in. She does it by breathing creativity and life into buildings and spaces that the rest of us gave up on. I admire her ability to build such a joyous community, and her tenacity in the face of obstacles along the way. Of course, Kat’s already working on what’s next.

Josh Gardiner, co-founder of Pep

Jamie Yates – who’s head chef at Melbourne’s Hope St Radio and has a postgrad in neuroscience and mental health – is the chef-in-residence this summer at London’s Chilli Con Carner. That’s Loyle Carner’s cooking school for 14- to 16-year-olds with ADHD, which brings in a new cohort each year and teaches them to cook alongside a rotating crew of guest chefs. Yates is teaching beside Jamie Oliver, an inspiration of hers, who’s driven systemic change in food, with a focus on young people. To me, Yates thinks beyond what’s on the menu; she sees the kitchen as a place where people think and feel, not just send out plates. That’s the energy the industry needs.

Mia Russell, co-owner of Baker Bleu

Melbourne’s food and beverage industry is at the forefront of global innovation, driven by our open-minded culture. As Australians, we’re reminded of this every time we travel, and coffee is a great example. I love Market Lane. They source exceptional beans, make amazing coffee and bring customers on the journey from farm to cup. They’ve been a pioneer of Melbourne’s modern coffee scene and continue to inspire through their commitment to quality, education and innovation.

Art, Design and Curation

Tony Albert, artist

Aretha Brown is one of the most innovative voices in Australian contemporary culture today. As an artist, activist and cultural leader, she has redefined what it means for a young First Nations person to use creativity as a vehicle for change, bringing together art, community and advocacy in powerful and meaningful ways. She is changing the landscape of Australian art by demonstrating that creativity is not separate from action, but a force capable of shaping public conversation, empowering communities and inspiring the next generation.

Jessica Spresser, co-founder Bessley Spresser

I’m inspired by peers who operate a kind of expanded practice. Not just architecture, but adjacent fields like exhibition design, furniture making or materials science. One example is Youssofzay Hart, who treat architecture and art display as similar pursuits, just at different scales. Their recent work at Chau Chak Wing and the National Portrait Gallery shows both sensitivity and inventiveness, and I’m keen to see how their practice evolves. 

Natasha Menon-Verheul, founder Menon Curatorial and co-owner Saison Aperitifs

I’ve always felt there's something incredibly bad-ass about defining innovation through conviction, not trend-chasing, and I’ve always been drawn to people who keep innovating instead of chasing what’s shiny. For the past 30 years Paola Antonelli, senior curator at MoMA in New York, has reframed curation as an act of attention rather than invention. She’s proven, time and again, the most radical thing a curator can do – whether curating art or people – is slow down and really listen to what’s already there.

Tyrone “Rone” Wright, artist

Manda Lane is an artist whose work I love encountering around Melbourne. Her practice focuses on botanical compositions that explore the tension between nature and the urban landscape. I’m consistently drawn to her pieces because they blend fragile, organic elements into a solid, constructed environment in ways that are often unexpected. I really respect how she embraces traditional street art methods while constantly pushing them into new forms.

Zoe Lowres, co-founder of Programa

Within tech, and particularly now with AI, innovation is increasingly difficult to define. The boundaries of what’s possible shift constantly, and things we thought were years away can be achieved in a fraction of the time. At that speed, innovation feels less like a fixed title and more like a way of working.

From a creative perspective, I see that approach in my friend, artist and fine art photographer Kate Ballis. She’s consistently been ahead of the curve, first using infrared photography to turn familiar landscapes into technicolour worlds, then presenting one of the first AI fine art photography exhibitions at Gallerysmith. She’s now bringing those ideas into a new series of watercolour paintings. What sets Kate apart is the way she combines emerging technology with tactile craft while keeping the work completely her own.

Tristan Ceddia, graphic designer and founder of Tric Studio
Working broadly as a creative director allows me to understand and interact with people across a range of industries. Many of them I am lucky to consider friends. In Melbourne, Audrey Shaw is doing something very special. Audrey has a spirit and air of mysticism about her that covers a lot of ground, from her time as an architect in Melbourne, across to London’s River Cafe, up to Tedesca Osteria in Red Hill, and through to her wonderful restaurant Carnation Canteen, and sibling Bar Carnation. The clarity Audrey is able to provide, through a consistent mix of warmth and space, food and drink, people and energy, is like nothing I have felt before in this type of venue.

Edward Linacre, designer and founder of Edward Linacre Studio

Other Matter’s Jessie French is an innovator in the commercialisation of algae biomaterials. Her achievement lies not only in creating an algae-based biofilm, but in identifying a practical, commercially viable application for the material. This is the true innovation: transforming a promising biomaterial into a product with genuine market demand, commercial feasibility and real-world success.

Richard Christiansen, founder of Flamingo Estate
The most innovative person in my world right now is Gonzalo Samaranch Granados, who, with his wife Martha Elena Chan Tuz, created Mestiza de Indias in the middle of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula.

In a region increasingly shaped by industrial agriculture, pesticides, mass tourism, and development, they’ve created a living laboratory where ancient Mayan knowledge and regenerative agriculture are put back to work. They rebuild damaged soil, grow food without agrochemicals, and rescue varieties that are being pushed toward extinction, which carry the genetic memory of the place.

Their work with vanilla is especially extraordinary. They discovered and are now protecting wild Mayan vanilla vines that have a degree of genetic diversity that has largely disappeared from commercial vanilla, much of which is propagated through genetically identical cuttings.

 We are always searching for the newest idea, the newest technology and the newest person to hero. Gonzalo has made me understand that innovation can mean precisely the opposite. He champions old seeds, old flavours, old insects and old ways of farming – not as museum pieces, but as practical tools for addressing modern questions about climate, nutrition, culture, employment and community. In a world addicted to novelty, protecting what is ancient, endangered and nearly forgotten may be the most radical thing anyone can do.

Rainbow Chan, artist
As a fellow Hong Konger living in Australia, Scotty So’s multi-faceted practice resonates deeply with me. His work explores the notion of authenticity, desire and identity through a post-colonial lens. I love the way his practice subverts gender and the politics of the body by blending drag, high fashion, mimicry and humour. There is a complexity in his work which I appreciate, a fascinating mix of lightness and darkness, beauty and the grotesque. 

Active

Sammy Prowse, founder of Universal Practice

Dr Rachel Zoffness is one of the most interesting voices in healthcare because she’s changing not just how we treat pain, but how we understand it. Her work highlights how many chronic pain treatments fall short because pain isn’t purely physical, it’s shaped by the brain as well as the body. By making modern pain science accessible and empowering people to take an active role in their recovery, she’s helping shift healthcare towards a more informed, compassionate and evidence-based future. It also aligns closely with our philosophy at Universal Practice: that health is about the state of you as a whole – and how your body, mind and movement work together.

Fashion and Style

Jenny Kee, fashion designer

 Jordan Gogos is one of the most innovative voices in Australian fashion today. He offers something genuinely different through the creation of wearable art, dissolving the traditional boundaries between art, fashion and design. It’s this fearless crossing of boundaries that makes his work so interesting. He’s not confined by the conventions of fashion, and I see him first and foremost as an artist whose canvas extends beyond the body. His richly imaginative wall hangings and furniture – together with his wearable pieces – create a truly multidisciplinary practice. His work is informed by his Greek heritage, giving it both a strong personal narrative and a distinctive visual language, drawing on inventive recycling techniques and an exciting mix of materials and mediums.

 Someone else to watch is Mary Argyropoulos, who actually worked with Jordan while she was at design school. I love Mary’s exaggerated silhouettes: statement shoulder pads, exaggerated flares, and layered skirts and dresses. I also appreciate the way Mary mixes textiles, textures and colours, or “clashes them together”, as she describes it.

Jordan Gogos, fashion designer

Mary Argyropoulos! She’s just about to jet off to Paris on a scholarship and has been making huge waves in Australian fashion – redefining how traditional techniques can be brought forward in contemporary ways. Since her grad collection last year, her work has been embraced by the industry for its material complexity, but also its ease of wearability and the sense of power it evokes in the wearer.

Samuel Lewis, fashion designer

I’ve been following Boloria, the new brand by designer Olivier Theyskens. He showed a new collection during Paris Fashion Week, which felt like a kind of reintroduction after a couple years’ hiatus. He represents an essential side of the industry – a darker, gothic, tailored aesthetic that’s been missing in the shift to quiet luxury. His slower approach to fashion and the idea that one can step back to work on craft and intention in one’s design is innovative and necessary.

The fashion industry has an overconsumption issue. Things seem less special and hold less value because they are so quickly shown and discarded. I’ve been looking towards designers and brands with a more anti-establishment approach to design and the fashion calendar. It’s innovative not in a futuristic or technologically advanced way, but rather in its return to old-world values and what made fashion so special in the first place; building worlds and stories using intention and feeling, allowing good things to take time.

 Quotes have been edited for length and clarity.

This story is part of Broadsheet’s special Innovation Issue, presented by Mercedes-Benz.