SVA Masters in Branding (MIB) was the first of its kind. What started as an experiment is now in its 10th year of developing the next generation of brand builders.

Ironically, the existing identity for SVA Masters in Branding just wasn’t working hard enough. With tough competition from other MA and MBA programs, low awareness among grads, and low relevance among employers, we were tasked with defining a strategy and brand identity to re-launch the program on their 10th anniversary to tell its story effectively and across the right channels.

We anchored the identity on a truth of the program: MIB has a course, faculty and environment set up to teach branding as a reflection of culture — that the discipline must always adapt and keep pace with cultural change. We coined this “Branding at the Speed of Culture.”

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First, we asked, what does it mean to be a master? Then we investigated the originals - Da Vinci and Michelangelo. Specifically, their creative practice. They never stopped - a continuous stream of creativity. It felt like a compelling visual metaphor for our idea - Branding at the Speed of Culture.

At the same time, attempting to avoid trends and tropes, we looked to the Masters of Graphic Design of the 60's — specifically Herb Lubalin and his geometric typeface, Avant-Garde, with overlapping ligatures being an essential inspiration.

We worked with typographer Berton Hasebe, to build a continuous typeface with hundreds of unique ligatures, creating an uninterrupted flow of characters that crash together and redefines like culture does. The new typography is at the heart of the rebrand, starring in everything from the campaign launch video, to a type-driven video series, social media content, poster series and more.