Willy Wong, President

Willy Wong is Chief Creative Officer of NYC & Company, the City of New York’s official marketing and tourism organization. He leads the creative vision for branding, advertising, design, and strategic partnerships across major civic initiatives and global campaigns. Willy is an adjunct at NYU and a graduate thesis advisor at SVA in both the MFA Interaction Design and MFA Designer as Entrepreneur programs. He often collaborates on book designs for Rizzoli, serves on the advisory board of SXSW Interactive, and also advises on the occasional startup. Before a career in design and advertising, he worked in software engineering at Sapient, management consulting at Pricewaterhouse Coopers, and private banking at JP Morgan. Willy received his AB from Dartmouth College and MFA from Yale University.

Glen Cummings, Vice President

Glen Cummings is a graphic designer and the principal of MTWTF. MTWTF works with clients, partners, consultants and vendors to collaboratively create publication systems, identity systems, signage systems and environmental graphics. Current clients include Lincoln Center Theater, The City of Newark, Columbia University School of Art, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, and the Metropolitan Transit Authority. Glen holds a B.F.A. from The School of The Art Institute of Chicago and an M.F.A. in Graphic Design from Yale University School of the Arts. Before starting MTWTF Glen was a designer and art director at 2×4, and before that a speed metal guitarist in Nashville, Tennessee. Glen is a lecturer in Graphic Design at Yale University School of Art and a founding partner of Safari 7, A Self-Guided Tour of Urban Wildlife along New York City’s 7 line.

Josh Smith, Treasurer

Josh Smith is a designer, writer and creative director. His work has been recognized with acclaim for over a decade and is part of the permanent collection in the National Design archives Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt. Originally from Canada, he worked in environment design at Gottschalk & Ash, before moving to New York to work in branding and a wide array of web, environment and communication design. He was a creative director at the Brooklyn studio Hyperakt from 2010-2013, expanding their portfolio to include branding, environment and digital products for multinational organizations. In 2014 he joined Collins, a brand agency, where he leads a wide variety of communication design and branding projects for cultural institutions and large corporations. Some of his clients have included: Google, The United Nations, the International Olympic Committee, Coca Cola, MTV, Target, Unicef, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, NBC and Sesame Street.

Melanie Wiesenthal, Education

Melanie Wiesenthal is a Partner at Deerfield, a retail, fashion and beauty focused design studio based in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. As Co-Creative Director, Melanie is a dedicated advocate of storytelling, with a firm belief that all design stems first and foremost from a great idea and that healthy partnerships with clients is the key to creating award winning work. Melanie’s experience working with both in-house creative teams like Victoria’s Secret Beauty, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia (where she first met and worked with her partner Yael Eisele), Origins, and Aveda has given her unique insight into how corporate design works. Before her in-house experience, Melanie designed for award winning design firms Carbone Smolan Agency and boutique shop, The Valentine Group, where she got a head start in the realm of branding, design for cultural institutions, retail design and packaging. Melanie is an Adjunct Professor at Parsons School of Design, where she has taught studio classes in typography and graphic design since 2003. She is currently a lecturer at the School of Visual Arts Masters in Branding program. Melanie has spoken at numerous conferences in the US and abroad on design and sustainable design including AIGA, Fuse and ENG Amsterdam. Her work, both corporate and freelance, has been featured by The Art Director’s Club, Print Magazine, Communication Arts, Graphis, Cooper Hewitt Design Museum, How Magazine and Graphic Design USA. Melanie was born in Toronto, Canada and is a graduate of McGill University, Montreal, and Parsons School of Design, New York.

Paula Scher, Emeritus

Paula Scher began her graphic design career as a record cover art director at both Atlantic and CBS Records in the 1970s and in 1991 she joined Pentagram as a partner. She has developed identity and branding systems, promotional materials, environmental graphics, packaging and publication designs for a wide range of clients, drawing from what Tom Wolfe has called the “big closet” of art and design history, classic and pop iconography, literature, music and film to create images that speak to contemporary audiences with emotional impact and appeal.

Paula is a recipient of the Chrysler Award for Innovation in Design, the TDC Medal and the AIGA Medal, she holds honorary doctorates from the Corcoran College of Art and Design, the Maryland Institute College of Art, the Moore College of Art and Design. She is the president of the Alliance Graphique Internationale, serves as Commissioner on the New York Public Design Commission, and was elected to the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame. Her work has been exhibited worldwide and is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, and the Centre Georges Pompidou, as well as many other institutions. Her teaching career includes over two decades at the School of Visual Arts, along with positions at the Cooper Union, Yale University and the Tyler School of Art. She is the author of Make It Bigger (Princeton Architectural Press, 2002) and MAPS (Princeton Architectural Press, 2011).

Steff Geissbuhler, Emeritus

Steff Geissbuhler is a designer of integrated brand and corporate identity programs. Steff has designed print materials, posters, architectural graphics, sign systems and exhibits for a wide variety of clients. In 2005 Geissbuhlerʼs work has been honored with the American Institute of Graphic Arts Medal for his sustained contribution to design excellence and the development of the profession. He has received awards from all major professional associations. Steff served as the U.S. president of the Alliance Graphique Internationale and has been a member of the board of the American Institute of Graphic Arts. He is a past president of AIGAʼs New York chapter.

Steff Geissbuhler received his diploma in graphic design from the School of Art and Design, Basel, Switzerland. He has taught at the Philadelphia College of Art, Cooper Union, Yale University and lectures throughout the country. Prior to forming his own design consultancy in September 2011, geissbühler:design, he was a founding partner at C&G Partners for 6 years and a partner at Chermayeff & Geismar Inc. for 30 years.

Rachel Abrams

Rachel Abrams is founder of Turnstone Consulting, where design strategy and graphic facilitation help clients see and say what they mean. Rachel has worked with City ID, Design Trust for Public Space, Ludic Group, Karsan Automotive, New York Times, Pentagram Design, and various corporations and public city agencies. Her writing about design has featured in the Design Council magazine, The Economist, Eye, Frieze, Good, Urban Omnibus and Wired. On the faculty of the School of Visual Arts Interaction Design MFA program, Rachel teaches, and has presented to AIGA, Creative Capital, Harvard GSD, Istituto Europeo di Design, Stern School of Business and SxSW. Previously, she taught at NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program, was a user experience strategist for IBM and for branding consultancy, Imagination. British-born and educated, Rachel is a graduate of Cambridge University and the Royal College of Art.

Charles Adler

Charles is an entrepreneur with more than 14 years experience in interaction design. Formerly director of strategy and senior information architect at Agency.com, his work in user experience, design and information architecture is driven by a commitment to all things clean and simple. Previously, he co-founded Subsystence—an online art publication, and Source-ID—and independent interaction design studio.

Su Barber

Su Barber is Art Director at Opening Ceremony, the global fashion brand and retailer. She oversees the brand’s visual identity, which includes the website, packaging, publications, events, textiles—everything down to the store’s doormats.

After receiving her BFA from Cooper Union in 2000, Su worked for five years with Scott Stowell at OPEN, contributing to award winning projects including the 2005 Bravo network redesign. Su’s client list reflects her connection to contemporary art and fashion: Rizzoli, Aperture, Blind Spot, North Drive Press, The Unified Field Collective, The Wild Unknown, Dashwood Books, Deitch Projects, Printed Matter, Urban Outfitters, Electric Feathers, Nike.

Ken Carbone

Ken Carbone is a designer, artist, musician, author and teacher. He is the Co-Founder and Chief Creative Director of Carbone Smolan Agency. Over the past thirty five years Ken’s distinct, concise and enduring design programs reached a world-class clientele that includes W Hotels, Christie’s, and Tiffany & Co., as well as celebrated institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles and the Musée du Louvre. Ken is a professor in the MFA Design program at the School of Visual Arts and recently co-authored “Dialog”: What Makes a Great Design Partnership, with his business partner Leslie Smolan.

Juliette Cezzar

Juliette Cezzar is the Director of the BFA Communication Design and BFA Design & Technology programs at Parsons / The New School. She established her small studio, e.a.d., in 2005. While books anchor the practice, her work has spanned a variety of media for clients such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, RES Magazine, The Museum of Modern Art, Vh1, The New York Times, Eleven Madison Park, and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Art, and Planning. She is the author-designer of four books: Office Mayhem (Abrams), Paper Pilot, Paper Captain, and Paper Astronaut (Universe / Rizzoli), and is currently co-authoring a fifth book, entitled Designing for the Editorial Experience (Rockport Publishing). She holds a professional degree (B. Arch) in Architecture from Virginia Tech and an MFA in Graphic Design from Yale University.

Carla Echevarria

Carla is a Creative Director at Google Creative Lab, and teaches Digital Media Design in the School of Visual Arts. A graphic designer by training and a geek by heart, she has spent the past decade developing work that expands the possibilities of human communication through emerging media.

She was formerly an Executive Creative Director at R/GA, and founded a New York startup focused on creating digital products and services for first-time urban parents.

Carla pursued her BA in Philosophy at St. John’s College, and MFA in Communication Design at Pratt Institute. She grew up in the Philippines.

Agnieszka Gasparska

Agnieszka Gasparska is the founder and creative captain of New York City-based design firm Kiss Me I’m Polish. Since 2003, Agnieszka has led Kiss Me I’m Polish through a prodigious array of projects across a variety of media and disciplines, from digital media to print. With a focus on branding, editorial, and interactive design, some of the studio’s most recent clients have included The Atlantic, Design Trust for Public Space, The Museum of Modern Art, National Geographic, and W. W. Norton. This past fall, Kiss Me I’m Polish also launched the Itty Bitty Project, a handmade line of creativity-inducing tees for kids (and soon, adults too). A graduate of The Cooper Union School of Art, Agnieszka began her career as an interaction designer at Funny Garbage. Born in Warsaw, Poland, she has lived in New York City for the last 25 years.

Hilary Greenbaum

Hilary Greenbaum is the Director of Graphic Design for the Whitney Museum of American Art. She manages the development of the museum’s identity across multiple platforms including advertising, exhibition graphics, signage, digital media, and various printed materials. Hilary holds a BFA from Carnegie Mellon University, an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts, and teaches as an adjunct professor for NYU’s School of Continuing Studies. Prior to her current position, she served as a staff designer and design columnist for The New York Times Magazine.

Randy Hunt

Randy Hunt is Creative Director at Etsy, where he leads a team of designers creating the end-to-end experience, both online and off. Hunt feels strongly that designers must be able to build what they design, a perspective that fits naturally with Etsy’s culture of making and the love of craftsmanship. Hunt co-founded Supermarket, a curated design marketplace. Previously, he founded Citizen Scholar Inc., a studio that worked with culture, education, social, and environmental clients including: Broadway Across America, DoSomething.org, SVA, and numerous writers and photographers. He writes and lectures about design and has been a visiting designer and critic at many colleges and universities. His book, Product Design for the Web, will be published in November 2013. Hunt is a graduate of the MFA Designer as Author program. In 2008 he was included in Print’s New Visual Artists and STEP Inside Design’s Field Guide to Emerging Talent.

Min Lew

As the Creative Director of Base’s New York Studio, Min divides her time between designing, directing, and managing. With a holistic perspective, strategy and a fresh approach to projects, she has worked with a wide range of organizations, among them Pantone, MoMA, Gagosian Gallery, Princeton Architectural Press, Coca-Cola, Fred Segal Beauty, Milk, Miami Art Museum, Gwangju Biennale, and Wellesley College. Her work has been featured in various publications and has won numerous awards over the years. Previously, Min has worked with B.I.G. at Ogilvy & Mather, Pentagram, and Simon & Schuster.

Min studied at Ewha Womans University, received a BFA from the School of Visual Arts, and an MFA from Yale. Born in Frankfurt, Germany, raised in Seoul, Korea, Min now calls Brooklyn her home.

Manuel Miranda

Manuel Miranda is designer and owner at MMP and a critic in graphic design at the Yale School of Art. MMP designs objects that connect audiences and institutions, and recent projects include exhibitions for the Center for Architecture and the Sheila C. Johnson Design Center at The New School, campaigns for City of New York, publication design for Metropolis Magazine, interactive design for the Nike Foundation, and institutional identity for Van Alen Institute. Prior to establishing his own practice, Manuel was an art director at 2×4, Inc. where he designed and lead projects for the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, New York City Opera, and Tiffany&Co., and a designer at Brand Integration Group at Ogilvy and Mather. He earned his M.F.A. in graphic design from the Yale School of art and B.A. from The Evergreen State College.

Jesse Ragan

Jesse Ragan has been designing letterforms for as long as he can remember, dating back to his childhood in North Carolina. He learned from the best how to make them into typefaces: as a student at RISD, as an intern at Font Bureau, and as a full-time designer at Hoefler & Frere-Jones. Since 2005, Jesse has worked independently in Brooklyn, developing typefaces and lettering for clients including Pentagram and House Industries. Among his design credits are collaborative contributions to Gotham, Archer, and Omnes. Jesse also teaches typeface design at Type@Cooper, the certificate program he co-founded in 2010.

Steve Rura

Steve Rura is currently a Creative Lead at Google Creative Lab, where he helps visually and conceptually direct product design, marketing, and advertising across the company. Before joining Google, he worked both independently and for various agencies as a graphic designer and art director, contributing to many clients such as Nike, Coca-Cola, Puma, Canon, and FedEx. He graduated with a BFA from Cooper Union, and now teaches at SVA.

Ian Spalter

Ian Spalter creates products and services designed to enrich people’s lives.

He is currectly the Director of Design and UX at Foursquare, a leading mobile startup based in NYC. Previously he worked at R/GA as the VP of Product Design leading the creative team behind projects such as the Nike+ Fuelband, Nike+ GPS, Nike+ Basketball and Nike+ Training.

Matt Spangler

Matt is a NY based entertainment exec who was recently named EVP of Content & Marketing for Tribeca Enterprises. The new position overseeing creative production and marketing across all Tribeca businesses including Tribeca Films, a year round distribution business, the annual Tribeca Film Festival (and its international licenses) and a new original content group.

After starting his NY career in the Comedy Central digital group, he was an original partner at thehappycorp global, where he proudly worked with clients such as Apple and Foursquare precursor Dodgeball, a co-founder of the infamous NYC creative “fight club” LVHRD, known for its artisanal events that fueled competition among NYC creative professionals and spent 2009-2011 running Winston Wolf Inc, a consultancy he founded to provide strategic services to brands such as Mercedes AMG, Reebok and more.

Todd St. John

Todd St. John is a designer, animator and filmmaker living in New York City. He grew up on the island of Oahu. In 2000 he founded the NYC-based studio HunterGatherer. St. John was included along with frequent collaborator Gary Benzel in the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Triennial: Design Now. In 2008, HunterGatherer won a Webby and was nominated for an Emmy for the animated short “Circle Squared”. In addition to the studio, St. John has taught as a lecturer in the Yale School of Art’s graduate program, and occasionally exhibits non-commercial work under his own name.

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