Explorez tous les épisodes du podcast DesignThinkers Podcast

Martina Flor is an award winning lettering designer, author, TEDx speaker and educator who helps designers develop expertise and creative voice so their work is impossible to ignore. Originally from Argentina, she moved to Berlin in 2010 where she founded her independent studio specializing in lettering, typography and custom letterforms. Over the past fifteen years she's collaborated with global brands including Adobe, Vanity Fair and Mercedes-Benz and spoken on stages around the world. 

Through her books, online programs, workshops and educational resources, more than a hundred thousand designers have used Martina's teaching to sharpen their visual judgement, master lettering and typography and build expertise that sets their work apart.

Her DesignThinker's keynote was called The Art of Seeing: How Letter Design Changes the way You See the World, it explored how creativity begins with seeing what others overlook. 

In this conversation, we're gonna talk about how she got her start in lettering, how she approaches teaching, how she built her online presence and what it means to observe before you start creating.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Nikki Gonnissen is co-founder and Creative Director of Thonik, the Amsterdam design studio she started with her partner Thomas Widdershoven in 1993. That’s the same year they met in Vondelpark, when Thomas spotted her eating ice cream with friends and followed her until she stopped to talk. What began as two solo practices under the clunky name "Gonnissen and Widdershoven" eventually became Thonik. A name built from their two first names: Thomas and Nikki. Thirty-three years later, they're still creative and life partners, running a studio that's stayed intentionally close to the same size, around 15 people, because, as Nikki puts it, grow too far past that and the work starts to slip through your fingers.

In this conversation, Nikki walks through two recent identity projects that show just how differently "moving people" can look in practice: a bright, kinetic identity for the Phion Symphony Orchestra, where the typeface bends and slants like a conductor's baton, and a complete overhaul of Schiphol Airport's identity, where the job was actually a practical one of stripping away visual noise and inconsistency until travelers could simply find their way. From there, the conversation turns to the argument at the center of Nikki's DesignThinkers talk: that as AI makes the world faster and more efficient, staying close (to yourself, to the people you design for, to what actually resonates) becomes increasingly more important.

This episode is for designers thinking about what to protect as their tools get speedier, for anyone building a studio and thinking about their philosophy, and for listeners who believe the most human parts of design are also the most valuable.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Erika Barbieri is the co-founder and creative director of OlssønBarbieri, a design studio in Oslo. The studio's ethos is built almost entirely around one idea: that packaging can be a portal into much bigger conversations about food. She and her partner Henrik met in design school in Florence, moved to Oslo in 2005, and spent years finding their footing before officially committing to the studio in 2012.

In this episode, Erika talks about how for her, good packaging design lives at the intersection of economic interest, cultural and social expression, ecological complexity, and aesthetics. That balance shows up in how the studio works, too. They’re as equally committed to research and storytelling as they are to creating beauty in the world. We talk about their work on Varus 775, a spirits package that was named Best in Show at the 2026 Dieline Awards, their work on Steroescope Coffee, an early wine project and her upcoming DesignThinkers talk. 

This episode is for designers who want packaging that does more than sit on a shelf, for anyone curious about the research that hides behind a beautiful work, and for the food lovers who've always suspected that there's some overlap between what tastes good and what looks good.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Goldie Chan is the author of Personal Branding for Introverts, the founder of the social strategy agency Warm Robots, and the Huffington Post once called her the "Oprah of LinkedIn." She built that reputation kind of by accident. She started posting a daily video on LinkedIn as a way to push her introverted self to speak on camera. She then went on to post 800 consecutive daily videos between 2017 and 2019, long before AI made that kind of output easy.

In this conversation, Goldie takes us back to her biology degree from Stanford, a failed fashion brand, and an intervention from her friends that nudged her out of a depression and into a marketing job that shifted her focus. From there we get into the real substance of her work: the five C's of personal branding, why she thinks the stereotype that introverts are quiet is a myth, how she protects her energy, and the surprisingly playful daydreaming exercise she uses to help people figure out what they actually want. We also get into her side hustles, which includes producing films and writing Archie Comics, and a candid conversation about why she chose to share her cancer journey publicly.

This episode is for anyone building their personal brand or working in branding. It’s also for the introverts in the room who feel like the current playbook wasn't written for them.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Five years ago, Gabby Lord and Lauren Wong started a design studio because a friend joked that they should—and because Gabby was, by her own admission, extremely burnt out and looking for a way out of her work situation. Those aren't good reasons to start a company, and yet SUPER KEEN is succeeding by most metrics. They complete 20 to 35 projects a year, have found a work-life balance that works for them, and have built a reputation for delivering solid design and strategy work.  

In this conversation, Gabby and Lauren walk me through the studio's early years. It was reactive, maybe a little chaotic, and included a website that instead of showing work, redirected prospective clients to a video of Tom Holland lip-syncing. They talk candidly about why they've kept Super Keen small despite pressure to grow, why they've published their studio's financials publicly every year, and how they're thinking about success.

This episode is for anyone questioning whether bigger is actually better. It’s for anyone feeling the pressure to scale—or to do things the way they’ve always been done. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Valentina D'Efilippo is equally comfortable immersed in science as she is in storytelling and graphic design. That tension has shaped nearly two decades of work translating dense, unwieldy datasets into visual stories: flowers standing in for a century of wars, a dandelion holding the shape of the #MeToo movement on Twitter.

A cold email from HarperCollins turned an early instinct for this kind of work into a profession—pairing her with data journalist James Ball on The Infographic History of the World, a book that's since sold in eleven languages and launched the career she now runs through her studio, Apostrophe One.

In this conversation, Valentina traces her path back to a graduate thesis on gender stereotypes in children's books. It was her first real data project, before she had a name for what she was doing. We talk about the responsibility of deciding what a dataset reveals and what it hides, and why she reaches for beauty and visual metaphor even when the numbers are devastating. She also opens up about revisiting her 2014 project Poppy Field last year: an analog visualization where each hand-painted mark represents a single Palestinian death, made largely in silence over sixteen hours and shared on Instagram. 

This episode is for designers, journalists, and anyone who's ever had to decide how to represent a data set—and felt the weight of that choice.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Edel Rodriguez refuses to be small or quiet. He’s the illustrator behind some of the most recognizable political images of the last decade. That 2016 cover for TIME Magazine, the one of Donald Trump melting down: that was Edel. The Der Spiegel cover of Trump beheading the Statue of Liberty. Also Edel. At this point, he's produced more than 300 images of a single, very orange, subject. As a kid who grew up in a country where saying the wrong thing about the wrong leader was dangerous, Edel has spent his career speaking up.

In this conversation, Edel talks about hustling his way into an art director at just 26 years old. We talk about how that experience informed his editorial illustration process. We talk about how social media is a great place to share the kind of work you want to be making and to rally interest until someone notices. We get into how he wrote his graphic memoir Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey backwards, designing the cover years before he wrote a word. We talk about how the book's ending—a visual rhyme between the events in Havana in January 1959 and the storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021—came together at the very last minute. He talks candidly about why he refuses to self-censor, why he's not tired of the Trump-based work, and why the question he'd most want to ask himself in twenty years isn't about politics at all.

This episode is for illustrators, designers, and anyone else who's been told to play it safe—and isn't sure they want to.

Hear Edel speak at the DesignThinkers conference, Canada's premier design conference, in Toronto and online this October 20–21, 2026. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Temi Coker. A Dallas based designer, photographer and the multidisciplinary artist behind Coker Studio. Temi’s client list includes Adobe, Apple, Google, HBO, Peloton and The Oscars. But almost none of it started with a client brief, it started with a self assigned poster a day challenge in 2016 made for no one but himself. And it led Temi to a belief that you should be making creative work just to make it. 

In this conversation, we trace that thread through his whole career, from a stint studying biomedical engineering to please his parents, to pursuing digital media for himself, from making a pillow because his wife thought his work would look good in people’s homes to a full fledged home collection at Walmart. From teaching photography and design at his former high school, so that students would have a model of what a Black creative professional looks like to finding the nerve to ask the Academy if he could steep his Oscars statuette artwork in Black history.

This episode is for anyone with an idea sitting quietly in their mind, something they haven’t started yet. Temi’s whole career is proof that the things you make for yourself are often the things that end up mattering the most.

Hear Temi speak at the DesignThinkers conference, Canada's premier design conference, in Toronto and online this October 20–21, 2026. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Dalit Shalom. Dalit is the Director of Product Design at The New York Times where she oversees the creation of new formats, spaces and tools that advance the future of storytelling. She also leads Design and Strategy for various work streams for the company's AI initiates, having previously focused on trust and credibility by developing features that clarify Times journalism for its readers. 

An educator as well as a practitioner, Dalit also teaches design thinking classes at NYU's Tandon School of Engineering and ITP.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Kenjiro Kirton. Ken is the co-founder and creative director of HATO, the London- and Hong Kong-based publishing house, design studio and concept store known for its playful, research-driven approach to culture, branding and digital experiences.

His work moves fluidly between publishing, interaction, retail, and storytelling, often blurring the line between design practice and everyday life. In this conversation, we talk about what happens when design escapes the boundaries of the studio—when research becomes fiction, when process becomes play and when creative practice becomes something lived rather than simply produced.

We also get into the value of iteration and experimentation, the similarities between cooking and design, building participatory creative communities, and why some of the most meaningful creative work happens along the soft edges between disciplines.

This episode is for designers who are interested in expanding everything design—and the design studio—can be.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers Podcast, I’m joined by Ariane Spanier, a Berlin-based designer whose work sits at the intersection of typography, culture, and editorial design.

Ariane has built a practice working closely with cultural institutions—museums, publications, and artists—where design isn’t just about communication, but about interpretation. She’s also the creative director and co-editor of Fukt, an annual magazine dedicated to contemporary drawing, known for its experimental and often tactile typographic covers.

In this conversation, we unpack her DesignThinkers talk, Type with an Accent, and what it means to think about typography not as something neutral, but as something that carries voice, identity, and history. We talk about the tension between rules and expression, how designers develop a visual “accent,” and why your first instinct is often the most honest place to start from.

We also get into her work on Fukt, and how using typography in a more physical, expressive way can shift how people experience a publication altogether.

This episode is really for anyone thinking about their own voice as a designer—how it forms, how it evolves, and how to trust it.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Dr. Dee Miller. Director of Product Strategy and Insights for Product Equity at Adobe. Dee is a researcher and innovation leader, working at the intersection of technology, design, and equity. She's focused on turning real world insights, into products that are more accessible, usable, and culturally relevant. 

In this conversation, we unpack what inclusive design actually looks like in practice, and why it's not just about compliance, but about building better more innovative products. Dee shares how her work at Adobe translates research into real product decisions. From improving accessibility features, to shaping how AI tools like Firefly are developed and deployed. 

We also talk about the tension between speed and accessibility, what it takes to advocate for inclusive design inside large organizations, and why designing with communities is critical to building trust and accountability. 

This episode is for anyone working in product, design, or research who wants to move beyond theory and start building experiences that truly work for more people.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Peter Smart. Chief Experience Officer and Managing Partner at Fantasy. Based in the Bay Area, Fantasy is a creative partner behind some of the world’s most widely used digital products. Working with companies like Disney, Nike, Spotify, Netflix, Meta, and Google.

In this conversation, Peter shares how he’s thinking about the next shift in digital product design. One where fixed interfaces and screen based experiences may no longer be the default. We talk about what happens when products become more dynamic and more personalized. How AI is reshaping the relationships between brands and users, and why designers may need to redefine their own value.

We also get into some of the trends Peter is seeing and why he thinks the most important thing designers can do right now is zoom out. To look beyond the tools, understand where value is shifting, and rethink what they’re really designing.

This episode is for anyone trying to make sense of where design is heading. Maybe you’re early in your career or leading a team or simply wondering how to stay relevant in a moment that seems to be changing every single day.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Nu Goteh, founder of  Room for Magic and co-founder of Deem Journal.

Nu’s path into design isn’t a straight line. He started out making graphics on early internet platforms, spent over a decade working in marketing for brands like Puma, Red Bull, and Sonos, and eventually returned to design through a deeper set of questions—about power, participation, and how he wanted to show up in the world.

In this conversation, we talk about what it really means to design with communities—not just for them—and why that work often comes down to time, trust, and budget. We get into the limits of performative “purpose,” the realities of working with clients, and how design can move beyond outputs to shaping systems.

We also talk about Deem Journal: a print publication that explores design as a social practice. We discuss why print as a medium still matters, especially as a way to document, archive, and expand what we consider to be design.

This episode is for anyone thinking more critically about their role as a designer—whether you’re early in your career or rethinking what your practice is really in service of.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Emmi Salonen is a Finnish graphic designer and art director whose work spans editorial design, visual identity, publishing, and exhibition graphics. She often works with cultural and institutional clients, bringing a thoughtful, systems-driven approach to typography and structure—with just enough play to keep things interesting.

Beyond the systems and the structure, Emmi has long been thinking about something deeper: the conditions that allow creative work to be sustainable over time.

Her new book, The Creative Wellbeing Handbook, explores creativity not as a lightning strike or a productivity hack, but as an ecosystem: something that needs tending to.

In this conversation, we talk about burnout, systems, slowness, education, and what it really means to protect your creative energy in an industry that often demands constant output. We also talk about typography, control, joy, and the small signals we ignore when we’re pushing too hard.

This episode is for anyone who loves design—and wants to keep loving it.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Elizabeth Goodspeed. Elizabeth is an independent designer, art director, writer, and educator oscillating between Providence, Rhode Island and New York City. Her work riffs on history and visual culture in ways that feel both smart and weirdly intimate. She’s a devoted generalist: branding, packaging, book & editorial design. She’s also known for her sharp writing on the culture of design as the American editor-at-large for It’s Nice That.

In this conversation, Elizabeth shares how her fascination with archives and ephemera became a creative method. We talk about how you can use design history without getting stuck in nostalgia, why research can be a powerful tool for original thinking, and what it means to design when you think in words before images. We also explore her approach to teaching, the value of slow craft, and how paying closer attention to the visual world around us can change the way we work.

This episode is for anyone who wants to build more depth into their practice. Whether you’re trying to move beyond trends, develop a stronger point of view, or simply learn how to turn curiosity into compelling creative work.

Let’s get into it. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Pali Palavathanan, co-founder and creative director of Templo. Based in London, Templo is a purpose-led design studio known for bringing creativity and activism together—working with clients like the UN, Amnesty International, and GF Smith, alongside grassroots organizations fighting for justice around the world.

In this conversation, Pali shares how his own experiences as a refugee shaped his desire to build a different kind of studio. We talk about what it means to take on projects where the stakes are as high as arresting war criminals or tackling corruption. We also talk about how to balance activism with commercial work, the importance of instinct in choosing clients, and why he believes design is both a privilege and a responsibility.

This episode is for anyone who’s ever wondered how design can drive real change—whether you’re looking to make your practice more purposeful, thinking about the ethics of the clients you take on, or simply curious about what it looks like to build a studio where values lead the way.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Pablo Martin, Creative Director at MUBI. A legend in editorial design, Pablo has spent four decades shaping the visual language of publications and brands across Spain, the UK, and beyond. His journey has taken him from a work placement with Massimo Vignelli to co-founding the Barcelona-based studio Grafica and then Atlas, to leading major cultural projects for clients of all kinds, to now steering the global creative vision of MUBI.

At MUBI, Pablo oversees everything from brand identity to experimental publishing—including Notebook, the streaming platform’s print magazine that treats cinema as both cultural archive and design playground. In this conversation, we talk about his path through editorial design, why he’s always resisted specialization, what it means to run an in-house team that thinks like a studio, and how print still has the power to push boundaries in a digital-first world.

This episode is brought to you by MUBI, a curated streaming service for great cinema from around the globe. Try MUBI free for 30 days at mubi.com/designthinkers.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Debra Bishop—an award-winning creative director and one of editorial design’s most influential voices. Over the past four decades, Debra has shaped the look and feel of some of publishing’s most iconic titles—from her early days at Rolling Stone, to launching magazines at Martha Stewart, to serving as a design director at The New York Times.

For the last eight years, Debra brought her bold, playful vision to The New York Times for Kids, a monthly print-only section beloved for its inventive layouts, striking typography, and respect for young readers. The project published its final issue at the end of August, though Debra continues her work at the Times. This interview was recorded before the official announcement came out—so you won’t hear us talk about the closure, but you might sense a little mourning in the conversation.

What we do talk about in this episode are the joys and challenges of redesigning magazines, what Debra learned from design legends like Paula Scher, Fred Woodward, and Robert Priest, and how she has continued to expand the possibilities of what publications for kids, women, and niche audiences can look like. We also explore why she still believes in the enduring power of magazines—even as the industry continues to evolve.

Whether you’re a designer, editor, or simply someone who’s ever loved a great magazine, this episode is packed with insight, honesty, and a whole lot of design wisdom.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Nadia Tzuo—an Emmy Award–winning motion designer and director whose title sequences have become cultural touchstones.

Nadia’s work spans television, film, and streaming, with credits on The Last of Us, Shogun, American Horror Story, Pachinko, Star Trek Beyond, and Captain Marvel. Her sequences don’t just introduce a story—they set its mood, build its world, and often become iconic in their own right.

In this episode, Nadia shares how she approaches title design as both storytelling and branding, the deep research that fuels her process, and why she thinks in moods before visuals. We talk about the importance of cultural specificity, the role of collaboration, and how streaming has reshaped the way audiences engage with titles.

Whether you’re a designer curious about motion, a film lover fascinated by world-building, or someone interested in the intersection of story and design—this conversation is packed with insight and inspiration.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Stephen Gates—global design leader, keynote speaker, and host of The Crazy One podcast.

Stephen’s career has spanned more than 20 years leading creative teams at companies like Apple, Citi, InVision, and McCann, where he’s built award-winning work across branding, product design, and customer experience. Known for his candid, no-nonsense approach to leadership and creativity, Stephen now works with organizations and teams around the world—helping them unlock better ideas, build stronger cultures, and navigate the complex realities of design at scale.

In this episode, we get into what it really means to lead as a designer, how to break out of safe thinking, and why creativity and business have to speak the same language. Stephen shares hard-won lessons on building trust with executives, the traps teams fall into when chasing innovation, and the mindset shifts that can make the difference between a good career and a great one.

Whether you’re a design leader, an ambitious creative, or just curious about what it takes to make work that matters—this conversation is equal parts practical, inspiring, and refreshingly honest.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Verònica Fuerte. Verònica is the founder and creative director of Hey Studio in Barcelona.

Since launching the studio in 2007, Verònica has built one of the most recognizable and beloved visual identities in contemporary design: known for bold color, geometric forms, and a relentlessly optimistic aesthetic. Hey’s work has spanned everything from brand systems and editorial design to public art and exhibitions, with clients like Apple, The New York Times, Monocle, and the city of Barcelona itself.

In this episode, Veronica shares how she built Hey from the ground up, starting as a solo designer with no clients, to now running a globally admired studio that’s remained intentionally small, collaborative, and independent. We talk about the importance of creative intuition, the realities of studio life, how to keep personal work at the center of your practice, and why she never wanted Hey to feel like an agency.

We also touch on making space for women in leadership, building visibility as a Spanish design studio on the international stage, and why sometimes the simplest ideas are the strongest.

If you’ve ever wondered what it takes to run a studio with heart and vision—this episode is for you.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Rachel Gogel. Rachel is an independent creative executive shaping the future of design at the intersection of brand, culture, and technology.

After building multidisciplinary teams at places like GQ, The New York Times, Meta, and Godfrey Dadich, Rachel launched her own consultancy in 2020. Since then, she’s worked with everyone from tech giants like Airbnb and Dropbox to smaller purpose-driven, often women-founded ventures.

In this episode, we talk about what it means to lead creatively—without being full-time. Rachel walks us through the rise of fractional leadership, how she designs her own career on her own terms, and why negotiating your worth is a skill every designer should learn. We explore the challenges of showing work that isn’t always visual, and the importance of making space for queer and marginalized voices in the industry.

Whether you’re freelance-curious, burnt out on traditional career paths, or just looking to redefine what success means for you—Rachel’s story will leave you feeling empowered, clear-eyed, and ready to think differently.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week on the DesignThinkers podcast, I’m joined by Kemp Attwood, partner at AREA 17. With a background in creative writing and new media design, Kemp has spent nearly two decades working at the intersection of design, strategy, and technology.

He has helped shape AREA 17’s global vision—leading interdisciplinary teams across Paris and New York to deliver transformative work for clients like The New York Times, Google, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the National Gallery of Canada.

In this episode, we dive into how design is more than just craft—how it becomes a system for delivering real value. Kemp shares his thoughts on behavioral branding, the rise of hyper-personalized UI, what AI tools get right (and wrong), and why making is still one of the best ways to think.

We also talk about long-term client relationships, running a distributed global team, and how 100+ office plants became part of the AREA 17 ecosystem.

Whether you’re deep in digital design or simply curious about how strategy, brand, and interface collide, this one’s packed with thoughtful ideas, a few laughs, and a whole lot of wisdom.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

We’re back with a third season of the DesignThinkers Podcast. 

DesignThinkers is Canada's largest graphic design conference. For twenty-five years, the Association of Registered Graphic Designers has been bringing together visionaries from a range of disciplines to explore creativity and the design process.

This podcast is an extension of that mission. We’re here to talk about process, creativity and the business of design with past and present DesignThinkers speakers. Join me, Nicola Hamilton, for another season of candid conversation with design leaders from all over the world. This season, I have plans to catch up with founder of Hey Studio, Veronica Fuerte, Design Director at The New York Times for Kids, Debra Bishop, Founder of TEMPLO, Pali Palavathan; and fractional design leader Rachel Gogel, to name a few. 

Tune in on Wednesday, August 6 for our first episode. We’ll have a new episode for you every Wednesday. 

Follow us on Instagram at @rgdcanada or visit us online at RGD.ca. And if you loved our previous seasons, please leave us a review. It really helps!

And if you like what you hear, join us at DesignThinkers in Toronto, happening October 1 and 2. You can find all the details at designthinkers.com.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This is our last episode of the season—and what a high to go out on! Adam JK is a Toronto-born, Honolulu-based artist whose illustrative work is rooted in honesty, humour and a little bit of darkness. His books and journals, including Things Are What You Make of Them, have sold over a million copies in 20 languages worldwide. Obsessed with aphorisms and ephemera, Adam's work seeks to craft new reminders from familiar sources, offering his brand of "back-handed optimism" as a token of encouragement and camaraderie for other creative, emotional and deeply human people. Our conversation takes us to all kinds of places. We talk about big transitions that span our personal and professional lives. We talk about downswings in our lives and the ways the Internet has ruined the experience of making things. We talk about reclaiming a sense of purpose in our lives—and how we’ve accidentally learned a lot along the journey of making and doing things.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week, I’m sharing my conversation with Eva Cremers. Eva might be a new name for our DesignThinkers audience! She’s a 3-D artist and animation director from The Netherlands. Eva blends her playful, graphic CGI style with her own graphic design sensibility to create charming, joyful worlds for a growing list of global clients including H&M, Meta, Amazon Music, Apple and Samsung. In this episode, Eva tells me how she sort of fell into 3-D animation as she familiarized herself with Cinema 4D in preparation for her first internship. She shares the ways her developing skill set actually gave her constraints for developing her signature style and how she still feels a sense of overwhelming joy when a cool, new project request lands in her inbox. We spend some time talking about Generative AI too. As an experiment, Eva trained a model on her own work. The results were hilariously mixed. Eva and I spent a bit of time catching up before we hit record, so we’re diving right into this conversation without any of the usual greetings.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week, it gives me great pleasure to introduce you, our DesignThinkers audience to Vincent Wanga. Vince is new to the DesignThinkers universe. He’ll be joining us on stage in Vancouver next month to talk about creative audacity. Vince is one of those multi-hyphenates—In this episode, we joke that “I do a lot of things” is our shared tagline. He runs a couple of different businesses and has his hands in a myriad of projects. For the purposes of our conversation, Vince is a design leader, a serial entrepreneur and brand consultant. As former VP and head of creative for one of the fastest-growing technology start-ups in North America, he oversaw corporate brand strategy and creative during a period of unprecedented growth. He was with the company from before their Series A to their achievement of a $1 billion “unicorn” valuation. But what Vince is most passionate about right now is creative leadership. In this episode, we dive into his career trajectory. We talk about overcoming adversity, the delusional optimism that he’s gained from those tough experiences and how valuable that delusion can be for entrepreneurs. We also talk about what it means to become a good creative leader and how those leaders should be thinking about new technologies like AI. Enjoy this one!

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week, I’m sharing my conversation with Catalina Estrada. Catalina is a Colombian illustrator now based in Barcelona. She reinterprets Latin American folklore and expertly documents the natural world in her stunning, and extremely colourful, artwork and patterns. Catalina has worked for major brands like Disney, Netflix and Coca-Cola but she’s also done heaps of self-initiated work for a host of global causes. In this episode we talk about her transition from design into illustration—a story that’s full of childlike curiosity and moments of kismet—and the ways her signature style has evolved over the years. My favourite bit is near the end, where Catalina talks about the value of active patience for creative people. She’s not the kind of patience where you sit on the couch quietly, but instead the kind of patience where you diligently do the work until something magic unfolds. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week’s guest is illustrator, art director and fine artist Carson Ting. Carson kicked off his career in Toronto before moving across the country for a dream job at Rethink. Today, Carson is best known as an artist and founder of Chairman Ting. He’s a bit of a legend in Vancouver, where his murals are plentiful and on occasion span entire city blocks. I’m catching up with Carson on the heels of a career reset. While Chairman Ting isn’t going anywhere, he’s doubling down on his fine art practice. We talk about his transition from advertising to fine art, his distaste for client feedback, and how much he loves the kind of procrastination that manifests as play. Plus, I ask him about the role bunnies have played in his life and work—something he’ll be talking more about in his DesignThinkers workshop, titled “Great designers don’t just create; they leave a mark”.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

In this week’s episode, I’m catching up with typeface designer Eleni Beveratou. While working toward her MA in Typeface Design from the University of Reading, she developed an interest in the science of reading for the partially sighted. Her research and findings were published in Digital Fonts and Reading by World Scientific. Today, Eleni works at Dalton Maag, an independent type foundry in London, England. Eleni has worked on projects with brands such as Airbnb, Oracle and Facebook. I’m always excited to geek out with Eleni! Her knowledge base is deep and she’s incredibly skilled at explaining complicated typographic ideas in plain language. Listen in as we discuss the qualities of a good typeface, how Eleni stays on top of—and integrates—changing technology into her work, and the complex world of licensing a font. Plus, near the end, Eleni gives us a little preview of her DesignThinkers Vancouver presentation.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

In this episode, I'm zooming into The Meg Lewis Fun House! Meg is an artist, performer and educator transforming the world through joy and playful design. Their bold designs burst with colour, bringing an explosion of energy to brands like Dropbox, Meta, Target and Pinterest. With a background in design, improv, clown, music and stage combat, Meg creates uniquely playful experiences through workshops and talks that spark laughter and inspiration. Meg guides both corporations and individuals to reshape how they work and create, inspiring audiences to tackle life's biggest questions through joy, creative exploration and career strategy. This conversation feels a bit like a pep talk. We explore the idea of leveraging your quirks to scare away the wrong kinds of clients, to ultimately, build the right kind of career for you.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

We’re back and so excited to bring you a second season of the DesignThinkers Podcast! 

DesignThinkers is Canada's largest graphic design conference. Since the year 2000, the Association of Registered Graphic Designers has been bringing together visionaries from a range of disciplines to explore creativity and the design process live and on-stage. 

This podcast is an extension of that mission. We’re here to talk about process, creativity and the business of design with past and present DesignThinkers speakers. Join me, Nicola Hamilton, for a season of candid conversation with creative legends like Meg Lewis, Carson Ting, and Adam JK.

If you like what you hear, join us at one of our conferences in 2025. DesignThinkers in Vancouver is happening this May 13 and 14, and DesignThinkers in Toronto will take place on October 1 and 2. You can find all the details at designthinkers.com.

Tune in on Wednesday, March 26 for our first episode. We’ll have a new episode for you every Wednesday. Follow us on Instagram at @rgdcanada or visit us online at RGD.ca. And if you loved our first season, please leave us a review. It really helps!

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week's guest is Christoper Doyle. With over 22 years of experience, Christopher has established himself as one of Australia’s leading brand and design talents. Based in Sydney, his independent studio, Christopher Doyle & Co., is celebrated for its sharp approach to visual identity, creative direction, campaigns, and digital design. Known for blending curiosity and beauty in his work, Christopher collaborates across disciplines to deliver award-winning designs for clients in music, architecture, film, and the visual arts. We caught up with Christopher for a live recording ahead of his DesignThinkers presentation. We talk about his best and worst projects to date, why he doesn't have a formalized process, the value of openly sharing ideas and how he balances work and family life. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Every year, RGD asks a different Canadian design studio or agency to tackle the conference identity. In these shorter episodes, I’ve been speaking with some of our past DesignThinkers Design Partners. My guest this week is Howard Poon, VP of Design at DDB Edmonton. In 2022, Howard and the team at DDB Edmonton tackled the conference identity for our triumphant return to in-person conferences. The execution was a restrained approach packed with iconography. In this episode, Howard and I go back in time to discuss the process that got them there. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

My guest this week is Partner, Executive Creative Director & Managing Director at BaseNYC. Min Lew was born in Germany, raised in Seoul, and now lives in Brooklyn. Min brings 20 years of experience across culture, technology, luxury, fashion, and more. Her impressive portfolio includes collaborations with clients like Apple, The New York Times, JFK T4 Terminal and MoMA. In this episode we talk about Min's path into design, how to move up the ladder within agency environments and what Min looks for in solid client relationships. Plus, Min lays out some advice for emerging designers. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Our guest this week is a global brand leader. Greg Hoffman is the former Chief Marketing Officer at Nike. For 28 years, Greg held marketing, design, and innovation leadership positions at Nike. His role in the rise of marketing and design through that period was recognized when Fast Company named him one of the Most Creative People in Business. Today his primary role is as founder and principal of the brand leadership platform, Modern Arena. In that position Greg advises Fortune 500 brands, startups, and nonprofits about creating brand strength, business growth, and social impact. He engages teams ranging from Apple, Google, and Netflix, to Lego, and Target, on how to build stronger emotional bonds through branding and creativity. In this episode, we’re talking about his years at Nike. That includes what it takes to manage and steer a 600-person design team, how to grow in big corporate environments, and why exploring interest outside of design makes us better designers. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Each year, RGD asks a different Canadian design agency or studio to tackle the conference identity. In these shorter episodes, I’ve been speaking with some of our past DesignThinkers Design Partners. My guest this week is Partner and Chief Creative Officer at BMD, Laura Stein. In this episode, I’m asking Laura to go back in time to 2020. Bruce Mau Design was our Design Partner in 2021, which meant they were working through the conference branding in the depths of a global pandemic—and the myriad of other crises we experienced during that time. What came out of their process was our DesignReThinkers conference. Listen in as we revisit the process that led us there. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Getting to chat with Gail Anderson is a dream. Gail is a designer, writer, and educator. And today, Gail Anderson is Chair of BFA Design and BFA Advertising at the School of Visual Arts. She spent the first part of her career working in publishing: books and then stints at The Boston Globe Sunday and Rolling Stone. She went on to make poster art for Broadway and off-Broadway productions at SpotCo before starting her own small design firm, Anderson Newton Design. She’s also one of the most influential Black designers in the game. In this episode, we roll it way back to the early days of her career. We talk about the value of mentors in our early days—and modelling success later in life. We talk about the challenges of switching lanes within the design realm. And of course, we cover her experience teaching design at the School of Visual Arts. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

My guest this week is graphic designer and writer Chip Kidd. At Alfred A. Knopf—where he has worked for over 38 years—Chip has designed thousands of book covers. A writer as well, Chip has authored two novels—‘The Cheese Monkeys’ and ‘The Learners’, both national bestsellers. His bio also includes lines like: He was an extra in ‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’ and an answer on Jeopardy in 2002. In this episode, we talk at length about designing book covers. We get into why Chip got into books in the first place, what his process looks like and all the trends he’s avoiding. We also talk about loss and the ways it does or doesn’t affect your creativity. This one is pretty special. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Each year, RGD asks a different Canadian design agency or studio to tackle the conference identity. In these shorter episodes, I’ve been speaking with some of our past DesignThinkers Design Partners. My guest this week is Mo Bofill. Mo is currently a Partner and Executive Creative Director of Design at 123w. In this episode, I’m asking Mo to reflect back on her experience as Executive Design Director at john st where she helped lead the DesignThinkers branding in the chaotic year that was 2020. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

My guest this week is Grace Hwang. Up until very recently, Grace was working at Microsoft as Partner Director of Device Research + Design. That role encompassed Device Design, Mixed Reality hardware and software, Accessibility, and Sustainability. She believes in the power of human-centered design to cultivate positive change in people, systems, and society—and she brought that belief to that role. In this conversation, we talk about our responsibility as designers, the future of computing, and the ways we bring our own behaviours into our work. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Brian Collins has presented memorable DesignThinkers talks dating back as far as 2006. Brian is a designer and co-founder of COLLINS, the business transformation company based in San Francisco and New York City. Brian co-founded COLLINS with Leland Maschmeyer in 2008 with a focus not on what they would make, but what they would make possible through design. In this episode, we talk about some of his past presentations, the importance of language in our work and we riff on the idea of risk taking.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Each year, RGD asks a different Canadian design agency or studio to tackle the conference identity. In these shorter episodes, I’ve been speaking with some of our past DesignThinkers Design Partners. In this episode, I catch up with Jonathon Yule and Thomas van Ryzewyk. Both Jonathon and Tom work at Concrete here in Toronto. Jonathon functions as their Director of Design and Tom as Creative Director. Together, they lead branding for DesignThinkers in 2019. We revisit that process—and yes, I ask them about the toonie.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week's guest is Robert Wong. Robert was born Chinese, grew up Dutch, was Canadian, and is now American. While studying to become an accountant in Toronto, Robert woke up one day, flew to New York, and became a graphic designer instead. Robert is best known for his time leading design at Starbucks and as one of the co-founders of Google Creative Lab, where he still works. In this episode, we retrace his steps to becoming a designer, we discuss how the Google Creative Lab operates, and we dive into how he's thinking about AI.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week's guest is Jennifer Kinon. Jennifer founded Champions Design with Bobby C. Martin, Jr in 2010. Today, Jennifer leads business, design and strategy at Champions. For more than a decade, the firm has crafted meaningful brand strategy and visual identity systems for some of the world’s best brands. At every point in her career, Jennifer has tackled big systems. She served as Design Director of Hillary for America in 2016, Design Director of New York City’s 2012 Olympic Bid and worked in Pentagram’s New York City office with Michael Bierut. In this conversation, we start with the early parts of her career and make our way through the ups and downs she's experienced as a designer and as a business owner.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Each year, RGD asks a different Canadian design agency or studio to tackle the conference identity. In these shorter episodes, I’ll be speaking with some of those folks—our past DesignThinkers Design Partners. In this episode, I catch up with Michael Romaniuk. Today, Michael is an Associate Creative Director at Zulu Alpha Kilo. After leaving pre-med in 2018, he executed a surprising direct mail stunt disguised as a FedEx delivery man. He was hired on the spot by Zulu Alpha Kilo and briefed within half an hour. That first brief? It was DesignThinkers. Listen in as Michael recounts that experience.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week's guest is Liza Enebeis, Partner and Creative Director at Studio Dumbar/DEPT®. Studio Dumbar is an award winning international agency with Dutch heritage. They specialize in visual branding and motion and Liza is directly involved in all their main projects. Liza also co-founded and co-hosts Typeradio.org, a podcast on type and design, and co-initiator of the Design in Motion Festival, also known as DEMO. In this episode we talk about her early career and the value of a little discomfort in our process. She also spills the beans on DEMO 2025, which will happen in January. There will be screens around the world—and for the first time ever, also in Vancouver. 

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

This week's guest is Michael Johnson. Michael set up Johnson Banks in 1992, after a decade learning design, branding and art direction across the globe. His company is known for how they define, then design, brands that make a difference. ‘Do great work for good people’ is their mantra. He’s produced an enviable portfolio of work and received countless awards, including D&AD’s highest honour, the President’s Award in 2017. In this episode, we talk about starting and sustaining a design business, the value of strategy in our practice, and the criticism the internet lobs at rebrand projects.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.

Each year, RGD asks a different Canadian design agency or studio to tackle the conference identity. In these shorter episodes, I’ll be speaking with some of those folks—our past DesignThinkers Design Partners. In this episode, I catch up with Hans Thiessen RGD. Hans leads the design team at Rethink—an agency that’s been named AdAge’s Creative Agency of the Year, one of Fast Company’s Top 10 Most Innovative Creative Agencies, and Strategy's Creative & Design Agency of the Year five years in a row, and counting. Rethink was our DesignThinkers Design Partner in 2017 and Hans was on the team that executed that work. Listen in as we recount that process—and the speed bump they hit along the way.

If you're curious to see and read more about the 2017 DesignThinkers branding, you can do that here.

Follow us on Instagram @rgdcanada or visit us online at rgd.ca. Purchase tickets to the upcoming DesignThinkers conference at designthinkers.com.