Jack Biesek, Biesek Design
Since founding Biesek Design in 1980, Jack
has become and industry spokesman, recognized for his wayfinding
and signage solutions as well as his ability to manage large
scale institutional projects. He has developed time-saving techniques
for planning and implementing architectural signage master plans
that have set new standards for the profession. Biesek Design
has had the privilege of working with some of the world’s
greatest clients including architects, universities, hospitals,
museums and national parks.
Jack is a member of the Society of College and University Planners
and is a past president of the Society for Environmental Graphic
Design, a non-profit organization that embraces many design disciplines
including graphic, architectural, interior, landscape, and industrial
design, all concerned with the visual aspects of wayfinding, communicating
identity and information, and shaping the idea of place.
Gladys Brenner, AB Design, Inc.
Gladys Brenner, President of AB Design, Inc.
brings sixteen years of experience in environmental and graphic
design to the team. Gladys’ educational background includes
a Master of Fine Arts degree in Design & Visual Communication
from Virginia Commonwealth University as well as Master of Fine
Arts in Architecture & Bachelor of Arts in Graphics degrees
from the University of Buenos Aires in Argentina. As such, she
has a profound knowledge of the relationship between building
architecture and wayfinding.
Gladys has knowledge of six languages including English, Spanish
and French and her exposure to diverse cultures during her educational
trips proves useful when approaching a signage project that will
impact visitors from a diversity of backgrounds.
She is eager to expand on her success in developing effective communication
systems which concentrate on the needs of a variety of users through
her participation in this project. Gladys has successfully conducted
research, developed surveys and performed brief interviews with patients,
visitors, staff and other individuals of medical facilities to evaluate
the use of medical function definitions and terminology, pictograms
and numbering systems related to signage to address the needs of
users with poor English communication or knowledge of medical terms
as well as illiterate users. Based on her research, Gladys has developed
icons for medical facilities as well as research laboratories.
Margaret Faye, FayeWorks Design
FayeWorks Design is a firm specializing in
the planning and design of custom architectural signage, with
a special emphasis on health care environments. Margaret Faye,
Principal, has a background that is rich in experience relating
to all phases of environmental graphics. Her experience with
identificational, informational and wayfinding signage for large
scale projects provides FayeWorks with the expertise needed for
complex and constantly changing environments. Meg’s years
of work as a designer and project manager in a large architectural
firm, design studios and the signage fabrication industry provide
her with the necessary knowledge in the areas of planning, design,
budgeting and signage technology.
Meg has over twenty four years of experience
in the field of architectural graphics. Clients include those
in both the public and private sectors. Prior to opening her
own firm in 1996, Meg was design director/ project manager at
Weidner Architectural Signage and at ASI Sign Systems in Sacramento,
for a period of ten years. She started her career as Senior Designer
at the architectural office of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill in
San Francisco. Meg received her Bachelor of Arts in Graphic Design
from Stanford University in 1977, with concentrations in architecture
and art history. She is a member of the Society for Environmental
Graphic Design (SEGD).
Heather Merrifield, Pictoform
Kate Keating, Kate Keating Associates
Kate, President of Kate Keating Associates,
has been integrally involved in the design of signage and wayfinding
systems for a broad range of market segments for over fifteen
years. Her experience spans healthcare, civic, academic, and
corporate markets.
Kate is responsible for business development, marketing and strategic
planning for the firm. As president of a thriving environmental graphic
design firm, she believes graphics truly impact the built environment.
Kate is a graphic designer and hands-on principal fully engaged in
leading a team of design professionals. Her goals are two-fold: one,
to ensure color, typography, materials and scale are seamlessly integrated
with architecture and environment; and two, to ensure client and
project goals are met.
Kate has a Bachelors of Science in Design from the University of
Cincinnati. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Society
for Environmental Graphic Design as well as the AIA and SMPS.
Wendy T. Olmstead, Ivy Tech
State College, Lafayette, Indiana
Wendy is a multi-disciplined designer and
educator with over twenty five years of experience. She has designed
interiors of hospitals, banks, restaurants, showrooms and office
complexes, and monitored the purchase, shipping, delivery and
installation of furnishings. She has worked as a graphic designer
in-house for IBM and Arizona State University designing graphic
identity programs and print collateral. Her work has been exhibited
twenty-four times nationally and internationally, including two
solo and sixteen juried exhibitions. Wendy has received eighteen
graphic design awards. Two pieces of her graphic design and one
sculpture are in public collections. For twelve years Wendy was
a full-time professor, teaching a variety of Visual Communications
classes to both graduate and undergraduate graphic and industrial
design students at Arizona State and Purdue Universities.
When Wendy began her master¹s thesis on wayfinding at the College
of Architecture and Environmental Design, she was awarded a research
grant from the SEGD Education Foundation. Her thesis concerns the
meaningful communication of messages across cultures with public
information symbols. This research has continued for nine years and
involves user surveys in various countries with quantitative analysis
by culture, gender and age. Wendy has given fourteen presentations
regarding her research, eight of which were refereed and four at
international conferences. She has published eleven times nationally
and internationally in a variety of academic disciplines. Wendy has
been a wayfinding consultant for Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona
and FHP Fountain Valley Hospital in San Diego, California. At present
she is the Assistant Director of Marketing and Communication at Ivy
Tech State College in Lafayette, Indiana.
Wendy has earned three design degrees: a Bachelor of Science in Interior
Design from Southern Illinois University; a Bachelor of Fine Arts
in Graphic Design from the University of Arizona; and a Master of
Science in Design in Design Theory, Methodology and Criticism from
Arizona State University.
Todd Pierce, President of Pictoform
Todd Pierce, President of Pictogram, is a
recognized leader in the field of graphics and wayfinding design.
With over twenty years of design and project management experience,
he has created signage programs for some of the world's largest
and most complex environments - from the redesign of the New
York City subway system signage program to identity and signage
programs for major colleges & universities, hospitals, cities & government
agencies and commercial & residential real estate developers.
Todd has won numerous design awards for his work and has lectured
around the world as an expert in wayfinding and visual communication.
He is the past president of the Portland Chapter of the Graphic Artists
Guild as well as previously serving on the National Board of Directors.
In 1999, Todd was selected as one of Oregon's "Forty under Forty" community
leaders.
Todd created and taught the first-ever college course on environmental
graphic design at Parsons School of Design, NY and is the author
of The International Pictograms Standards. In 1992, Pictogram, Inc
was relocated to the Pacific Northwest and named Design Pacifica
International.
Jim Bolek, JRC Designs
Jim Bolek has over eighteen years of professional
experience in graphic and environmental graphic design. He is
experienced in all aspects of the creative process including
the initial programming and design, as well as planning and coordinating
between clients, municipalities and fabricators to oversee projects
to their successful completion.
He has developed sign systems and designed interpretive trail signs
for large master planned communities, juvenile detention facilities,
hospitals, office complexes, and resorts. In 2003, Jim researched
and co-authored with Jamie Cowgill the report "Symbol Usage
In Health Care Settings for People with Limited English Proficiency," which
evaluated the use, or lack of use, of symbol graphics in health care
settings throughout the world, and also made recommendations for
improving implementation and use of new symbols.
Jim has coordinated all phases of environmental graphics projects
for office, retail, and residential environments, and has taught
classes in EGD at the University of Arizona and Northern Arizona
University.
Jamie Cowgill. JRC Design
Jamie established JRC Design
in 1988 with a philosophy “responsible design: Design packages
should be responsible to the client and responsible to the end
user while maintaining the integrity of the design”. Jamie
believes that understanding construction and code compliance
issues is the responsibility of the designer. Design is not just
the creation of concepts and ideas, but the follow through of
those designs into tangible and functional information and signage
systems.
Jamie’s environmental graphic design expertise stems from more
than twenty years of professional experience in the graphic design
field. Since 1983, she has been devoted almost exclusively to environmental
graphic design and corporate identity/communications for the built
environment. JRC Design's projects include comprehensive interior
and exterior signage systems, wayfinding, construction drawings and
management, design guidelines, code compliance and municipal representation.
Jamie has extensive knowledge of the various municipal sign codes
and design review processes. She helped initiate and write the first
comprehensive sign package review request for a special use permit
process in 1986 with the City of Phoenix.
As a professional design member of SEGD (Society for Environmental
Graphic
Design) since 1983, she has also been Southwest Regional Representative
since 2001. She and the firm are all active in SEGD, ASA (the Arizona
Sign Association) and Valley Partnership organizations.