Stella Bugbee‘s talk at Apple’s SoHo store last evening was an exercise in examining scale.

Scale, as in the scale of a young graphic designer’s control over her work, the scale of her projects, her clients, and ultimately her audience. How much breadth can the work of Stella Bugbee, a mother of twins, span in less than a decade?

A lot, as evidenced by the range of spreads and photographs she had prepared for us.

Stella Bugbee’s audience shared an introspective and intimate hour as she pored over pieces of her work—from her college days at Parsons and all through the spreads she had composed for Condé Nast’s Domino magazine.

Interwoven between covers for Stella Bugbee’s pet project, Topic magazine, and designs for Ogilvy and Mather is a persistent struggle—a constant tension between unconditional creative license and large-scale, collaborative efforts in the design arena.

From binding zines to art directing popular magazine covers, Stella Bugbee has made it a point to “embrace both the large-scale and miniscule,” to marry the two. At the end of her presentation she asked the audience, “Perhaps this is too idealistic? Has anyone found a perfect or happy scale to work?”

For Ms. Bugbee, teasing this boundary is most ideal.