At a time when fake news has proven to have real-life consequences, we partnered with The News Literacy Project to create an innovative campaign that promotes the importance of news literacy, especially among youth.

The #SeeAlltheAngles ad campaign, features an original sideways facing font or typeside, designed by us, that puts a literal spin on the English alphabet, flipping each letter on its side and encouraging readers not to take headlines or news at face value, but rather to dig deeper. 

The design is intended to give the reader pause. The time it takes one to decipher the font, mimics the amount of time and care readers should take when reading and internalizing a typical news headline.

Through donated media, these headlines were placed online and in print in Fox News, The Wall Street Journal, AOL, Miami Herald, Detroit News and many more.

There were several parts in the making of this project. They included designing a functional typeface, creating posters to spread the word, getting the media involved and building a mobile app that created social post for you to share. 

SS+K and the Mayor’s Office of New York launch “No Stopping New York” to celebrate the everyday people of this amazing city who keep moving forward, and keep making this city a better place for everyone in it, no matter what.

CREDITS: AGENCY: SS+K

ECD: Stevie Archer

AD / DESIGN DIRECTOR: Aaron Padin

CW: Ryan Hrbek

FILM PRODUCTION: Greenpoint Pictures

FILM DIRECTORS: The Hudson Dusters

PHOTOGRAPHY: Brittainy Newman

CUSTOM TYPEFACE:

Working with LuxTypo we developed the custom typeface Unstoppable Modern. Referencing the city's industrial heritage, Unstoppable symbolizes the strength and resilience that New Yorker's have shown during the pandemic.

Built for the 15th annual Tribeca Film Festival, the ReActor used voice recognition, facial expression recognition and motion sensors to score anyone against real celebs in real scenes. Top scores won tickets to the festival. The ReActor was placed all over New York as well as being a key feature at the Festival.

Puma had lost it’s way by forgetting it roots in Sport. Puma knew they needed a change to recapture their competitive edge.

The design system was based on the sole fact that Puma Athletes are different from other brands. They are the rogues of sport and are unapologetic about it. We harnessed that energy to come up with cross out the negative and accentuate the positive.

Featuring the World’s Fastest Man, Usain Bolt, football icons Mario Balotelli, Sergio Agüero and Marta Vieira da Silva; golfers Rickie Fowler and Lexi Thompson; and the Scuderia Ferrari Formula One team, the campaign sees these sports men and women challenging convention and taking risks through determination, bravery, confidence and joy.

The task was to develop a campaign look & feel that would work across print, OOH and digital media globally and in several different languages. We then created a tool-kit that was shared with production companies around the world to reproduce additional content.

A quirky logotype for Cahoots Studios a creative first production partner by Stagwell. The branding reflects the friendly approach that Cahoots takes when dealing with clients and partners.

The two O's in the logotype are linked, yet they bear a purposeful cutline, symbolizing their connection while retaining individuality.

The “S” is tilted to convey that unexpectedness you can rely on when working with Cahoots.

The Tribeca Film Festival has become a staple of culture in New York City. To celebrate its 15th year, we created a campaign that includes print and out of home and digital components, celebrating iconic landmarks of New York City along with famous scenes throughout the history of film.

The design idea was simple, take out the bar in the Tribeca logo and use New York scenes as a replacement. This demonstrated how integrated the festival and New York truly are.

Normally The One Show doesn’t have the same agency design their call for entries twice, we were the first.

The integrated “Be Famous Famous” campaign is a tongue-in-cheek take on fame and how The One Show can make it possible. It includes print, video and interactive and makes a comical statement about how winning a coveted One Show Pencil is the only way to be not just industry famous, but “famous famous”. There’s a lot of tension in the world right now, so we wanted to create something that makes people smile and said Aaron Padín, Head of Art & Design, J. Walter Thompson New York. We took a hyperbolic look at what it means to win at the One Show to poke a little fun at ourselves.

The limited-edition Walmart Wrapping Bag is a shopping bag that converts into actual wrapping paper. It saves Walmart’s price-sensitive audience money and the hassle of lugging around wrapping paper during the holiday season.

We leveraged an item that already exists in the shopping experience and gave it a second life. Instructional tags in both English and French (Walmart Canada) guided customers to perforation lines along one side near the base and near the top of the bag allowing them to deconstruct the bag without scissors. Tape was the only required tool, making it appropriate for all ages to use.

In 2010, Burma held its first elections in 20 years. These elections would have been meaningless if more than 2,100 political prisoners remained locked up in Burma’s squalid prisons. Human Rights Watch & JWT NY created an interactive installation at Grand Central Station, New York. The installation featured a mock prison with 200 miniature cells and 2,000 pens in lieu of cell bars.

Visitors could remove the pens to symbolically free the prisoners, and then use the pens to sign an onsite petition calling for their release. The petition book was then sent to the United Nations’ Secretary General and leaders of countries that maintain close ties with Burma. Due to its success, the installation toured Prague and Brussels.

More importantly more than 150 political prisoners have since been released.

Bongiovi Acoustics DPS is a world-renowned audio technology company built on the foundation of pure Rock and Roll breakthroughs. We rebranded Bongiovi Acoustic Labs from the inside out starting with their core business architecture and company name. We then packaged and presented them with tools to express their new brand voice and brand vision. We took it a step further by codeveloping Aria, an audio innovation prototype, transforming the company beyond the world of entertainment, into a solutions driven audio company.

Few people realize that veterans face their toughest battle after they return home from war. Joblessness, homelessness, mental illness and a general lack of purpose burden many of them, but together with SUS, we created a self-sustaining program for our vets. It began with a traditional ad campaign and culminated in developing the first restaurant franchise entirely owned and operated by NYC vets, serving them long after the parade.

Another aspect of the campaign was the proposal for a longer commemorative period for vets, which spawned the logo design for American Veterans Month.

Smirnoff was well known as a party and nightlife brand. With lagging sales and a more competitive field, Smirnoff knew they needed a change. Working with strategy we moved Smirnoff to a lifestyle brand focusing on their main product “21”.

With a new look and feel and an extensive style guide we helped Smirnoff launch this new position to every market globally. Smirnoff "Yours For The Making" was about how the audience can control their destiny, pursue new paths and have the spirit of inventiveness just as Pierre Smirnoff did. The design of this brand book is a visual manifestation of Smirnoff's reinvention which is based on their heritage.

The task was to design a logo that conveys their missions and the sense of trust and safety.
Modern slavery affects 36 million people in the world. The Fund is established in the effort to eradicate modern slavery. They work with governments, international organizations, businesses and civil society groups for the cause. 

The symbol represents for the efficiency, strength, diversity and collaboration. Each shape incrementally reducing in size illustrates the process of ending slavery. In reverse, they also represent the growing impact of the fund. The negative space in the center signifies the fund’s goal: a slavery-free world. 

This mark is also meant to change its shape based on the progress. The last stage of the adaptation is an abstract shape of a bird flying, symbolizing the freedom.

A set of 12 minimalistic postcards was designed to celebrate the launch of Quantum of the Seas, the new cruise ship of Royal Caribbean International.

We wanted to create communications as simple, elegant and breakthrough as the new ship itself. Only using their four brand colors, each postcard illustrates the ship’s innovative features including: North Star, RipCord by iFLY®, the bow, Robotic bartender, FlowRider®, Gastronomy, Rockwall, Bumper car, Broadway musical, Zipline & Aqua theater, Virtual Balcony and Pool.

The SummerStage music and performing arts festival is a major cultural icon in NYC. For 30 years, it has encouraged New Yorkers to explore new genres, artists and boroughs. The challenge was that most people are still not aware of the range of shows and venues that the festival covers. The solution was to develop a visual language that nods to NYC icons across our five boroughs as well as the NYC subway, which connects them all.

A social responsibility campaign for Enersur GDF, Peru.

Through the Better Beckons campaign, we wanted to visually capture Beringer's belief that a better tomorrow is always beckoning, and a spirit of American optimism that can and will lead us there.

Partnering with Social Influencer & Photographer Murad Osmann, and his wife Nataly, we were able to capture the essence of Better Beckons in a captivating series of six images taken throughout America.

More importantly Beringer was able to increase their followers after every post that Murad & Nataly did.

The print work has been featured in Wine Spectator, Food Network magazine, Condé Nast, AFAR, Food & Wine, Travel + Leisure, and the Wall Street Journal. The out of home work has been on display on billboards across the country.

When a brand is as well known as Energizer, it comes with good and bad qualities. It's a trusted brand when it comes to batteries, but the holdings company represents 30 brands in 50 countries all over the world. The challenge was to revitalize Energizer Holdings and expand perceptions beyond the bunny. The new trademark must recast how people think of and talk about the overall company and corporate culture. Thus, an evolution of the iconic wordmark was born.

The integrity and heritage of the brand is retained in the original Energizer wordmark, which was left unaltered. Instead, a graphic mark that communicates ideas of growth, movement and forward thinking were added to complement the original logo’s angles and energy.

Working with seven artists, each assigned to an iconic moment in history and culture, we developed a timeline exploring the history of Puma and the direction it’s heading. Working on a canvas size of 24x36 inches, each artist worked in iconic styles relevant to their assigned decade.

The American graphic designer, David Carson, created the 1990s piece, a style done in the “grunge typography” that he defined in that era. Buff Monster, known for his hand-silkscreening techniques created a piece for the 2000s. The pieces were structured into a timeline. At the end of our timeline is the “Future,” represented in a white Puma Suede shoe on a white canvas to show that the future of the shoe is yet to be defined. It’s an invitation to create the next big moment.

PIECES

1960s Tommy Smith 1968 Olympics, Psychedelic Art

1970s Walt “Clyde” Frazier, Abstract Geometric

1980s B-Boy Culture, Graffiti Art

1990s Grunge Rock Music, Grunge Collage

2000s Skateboarding Culture, Graphic Illustration

2010s Usain Bolt Fashion and Sports, Minimal Art

FUTURE Future, Unwritten Style

Macy’s is America’s largest department store and the go-to place for kids to mail their letters to Santa. This year, as part of the long-standing campaign “Believe,” we asked kids to do more than just believe in the power of the holiday spirit. We asked them to make others believe by doing good deeds, one magic wish at a time.

This project allowed for us to reimagine how Macy's as the letter writing destination, could evolve through the creation of our Wishwriter pen that was sold in stores around the country.

Macy’s Wish Writer is the most-magical stylus ever created. When paired with our cheer-packed mobile app, kids can send letters to Santa filled with magical inks, vibrant colors, and their own creativity.

Simply scan the pen with the app’s built-in camera and add all sorts of animated magic to your letters. The Wish Writer app is decked with minigames, activities and a narrative highlighting the importance of kindness and generosity.

Partnered with Media Monks

Nobody likes flying during the holidays – especially when you're not flying JetBlue. So during the 2009 holiday season, we launched The Flyer's Collection. A series of high-end, albeit fake, products that make flying other airlines just a bit more like JetBlue.

We launched this campaign on Facebook and distributed Sky Mall inspired catalogs in newspapers and airport car services. We even setup a pop-up store in NYC's Meatpacking District using the props from the shoot.

So what do you do when the holiday season is over and you have 2 weeks left on a space you rented for the pop-up store?

Scroll down to the end to find out.

‘Yes, Virginia’ is a 30-minute animated Christmas special that was pitched and sold to CBS, premiered in prime time, and received glowing reviews. But unlike traditional shows, it was actually produced by an ad agency for Macy’s, as part of the brand’s holiday campaign ‘Believe’. Based on actual events, the story took place in New York in 1897, when a little girl namedVirginia went looking for the truth about Santa. Like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, we crafted the show to be a perennial classic. To quote USA Today: ‘Like Santa himself, Virginia should be a welcome Christmas visitor for years to come.’

A very exciting project that stretched everyone involved, from the creatives on the account and even our client. Something of this magnitude doesn’t get done without the support of everyone involved.

I was charged with designing the logo, the poster and DVD. I oversaw the look & feel, extended product line and one very special task I thought I would never get a chance to do, become the temporary creative director for the Macy’s Balloon Studio.

The task was to design a call for entries for the One Show Awards ceremony that would grab the creative world's attention and encourage people to submit work. Re-imaging the indian proverb, “First deserve, then desire, we created two mandalas to lead the viewer through the journey one must take to obtain the golden pencil. This concept, initially intended for one aspect of the One Show Awards, later influenced several others including an online game, posters, and the ceremony itself.

Music lets us share things that are hard to talk about. One of those difficult topics is mental illness. Shadow River by Boola ft. Jeni Fujita is one of the songs in the #IWILLLISTEN album meant to break the stigma of mental illness.

The task was to create a music video that would bring a song about living with a mental illness to life in a piece of film that could be both emotive and visually expressive. Below is the final product.

Roger Federer and Nikolay Davydenko were set to battle it out on the famed clay court. MSTF Partners wanted to create a print and poster campaign that had stopping power. Something that would bring to light the gravity of this match. Federer won after Davydenko pulled out with a leg injury. It was also a win for the agency as well, winning big at the CCP Festival.

I ran the global rebrand of J. Walter Thompson (JWT), one of the world’s largest and oldest advertising agencies. Historical assets were leveraged and combined with a bespoke typeface. The rebrand needed to be flexible to accommodate 10,000 employees in 200 offices located in 90 countries; speaking 14 different languages.

By not going with typical laundry detergent print ads, we redefined the category of print and OOH and helped Tide stand out against its competitors. Stains Don’t Stand a Chance was one of those projects you just know will work. We used the simple good vs bad theory to demonstrate the power of Tide Ultra 2x. Basically creating a demo in static form and winning a Grand Prix at Cannes.

Huggies needed to do a 30 second promo spot for their rewards program, enjoy the rewards.com. Normally this would be a straight V.O. over copy and an image. Being design led it was taken to a more interesting place while still being on strategy.

Bloomberg needed a way to visualize their data. They were looking for quick turnaround content that appealed to their viewers as well as a new audience. We created snackables and short form infographics.

Adstruc’s core business is selling outdoor advertising spaces online through their platform. As adstruc started to grow larger they felt it was time for a rebrand. A unique company with a bit of wit we developed a tongue in cheek logo that is based on one core thought, billboards and pigeons. Taking it one step further as adstruc is an online platform, we made the pigeon bit-mapped.

Services for the UnderServed (SUS) has been helping individuals and families faced with a wide range of challenges, mental illness, developmental disability, physical disability, AIDS, homelessness and poverty since 1978. SUS' core mission is to transform the lives of the people it serves. To play on this, we transformed the most stereotypical symbol of American homelessness, the cardboard box, into something beautiful. With the help of a local artist and current SUS residents, we used the cardboard to create a life-sized replica of the housing SUS provides to its members, down to the last detail.

Part of the Yours For the Making campaign, H82G8 was an initiative to recruit Influencers and Cultural Icons to partner with Smirnoff and stamp out hate through creativity. This direct mail piece was personalized with a custom call to action and a mirrored panel so the viewer can see themselves in the messaging.

Getting sick is an unfortunate inevitability. But you can’t stay home every time you have a scratchy throat. That’s where Halls comes in. They might not cure you, but they’ll give you that little boost you need to get through the darkest months of the year.

We created a print and OOH campaign to illustrate how with the help of Halls these brave souls soldiered on even when sick.

We created a font entirely out of Halls lozenges, to demonstrate how the product itself represents the little pep talk you might need when feeling under the weather.

These days it is not advisable to go anywhere when you are sick or feeling poorly however these came out prepandemic.

Sports Illustrated’s logo is just that, a logo. It is a custom logotype with no known typeface base. So what do you do when you need the full alphabet? Create it. For the SI print campaign we did just that.

It takes a force as powerful as a tornado to fight the damage caused by one. The Red Cross of Portugal is just that. To visualize that sentiment I created a tornado made out of red crosses to symbolize the speed and tenacity with which they help.

To promote a three minute car loan application process. We created a print campaign for Interbank in Peru using unfinished works of art; Mosaic, rug, pointillism and paper balls were used to demonstrate the concept of people beginning detailed work with great focus, before losing patience. “Some people can’t wait. We offer car loans granted within 3 minutes”.