Jessica Helfand

Jessica Helfand|Audio

S11E7: Using Design to Show the World Your Truth with Dionna Dorsey and Production Designer Olivia Peebles

This episode of DB|BD features two extraordinary women from two seemingly different corners of the design world, Dionna Dorsey and Olivia Peebles.

Ellen McGirt|Audio

S11E6: Why an Inclusive Global Economy is a Redesign Project with Mastercard’s Shamina Singh

In this episode of DB|BD, Shamina Singh, the co-founder and president of Mastercard’s Center for Inclusive Growth, explains why extreme poverty is the ultimate redesign challenge.

Ellen McGirt|Audio

S11E5: WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert on Talent, Activism, and the Business of Basketball

In this episode of DB|BD, Cathy Engelbert talks about the meteoric ascension of the WNBA and the unusual mix of talent, activism, fans, and business that make it a league like no other.

Ellen McGirt|Audio

S11E4: Richard Buery and Robin Hood Are Building a Coalition to Tackle Poverty in NYC

In this episode of DB|BD, Robin Hood CEO Richard Beury explains what is driving the uptick in poverty in New York City, how effective partnerships are built, and why he’s betting that AI will become an unexpectedly powerful …

Jessica Helfand|Audio

S11E3: The Healthy Materials Lab says Everyone Deserves a Healthier Home

In this episode of DB|BD, Healthy Material Lab co-founders Jonsara Ruth and Alison Mears explain why they focus on affordable housing, what harmful materials are lurking in our homes and how healthy alternatives can be made accessible and …

Ellen McGirt|Essays

What does it mean to observe the observer?

Ellen McGirt|Audio

S11E2: How Franklin Leonard is using The Black List to Redesign Hollywood

Through the Black List, Franklin Leonard is making Hollywood a true meritocracy.

Jessica Helfand|Interviews

Josef Koudelka, Next: A Visual Biography: Ten Questions for Melissa Harris

“It was essential that I humanize Koudelka and extricate him from the more reductive and pedestaled realm of myth where so many position him," says Harris.

Ellen McGirt|Audio

S11E1: How to Throw a Party to Change the World with Carrie Mae Weems

In this episode, Carrie Mae Weems talks about her work, her role in public life, the intersecting crises in the world, and the power of convening people through art to confront big truths.

Jessica Helfand|Profiles

S11E0: Meet the Redesigners

Jessica Helfand|Exhibitions

Type is (More Than) Image

From record albums and book covers, to editorial illustration and identity programs, to three-dimensional environmental graphics all over the world, typography has always stood at the core of Paula Scher’s work.

Cindy Chastain|Conversations

Design Observer x Mastercard

For three days in March, we gathered with some sixty people—designers and scholars, social entrepreneurs and independent consultants, creative leaders and senior practitioners from across a range of industries—to discuss the …