2013 Slate of nominees

Deborah Adler is a designer, entrepreneur and mother of two. Her work is guided by the belief that meaningful innovation requires a deep understanding of the people at the heart of her design and the changing world that surrounds them. As the principal of Deborah Adler LLC, Adler and her team pioneer self-initiated projects and work with clients to design experiences, change behaviors and improve outcomes.

Prior to forming her firm, Adler partnered with Target to develop the ClearRx prescription packaging system. This work started as her MFA design thesis at the School of Visual Arts and resulted in a completely reinvented pharmacy experience. Since then, Adler has taken on design challenges that range from tackling the number one hospital-acquired infection to reimagining baby bottles as playful objects that connect with children. At the core of her work is the understanding that design can make a positive difference in people’s lives.

Previously, Adler worked closely with Milton Glaser, as his senior designer, for five years. She has been featured in New York Magazine, Glamour and NBC Nightly News. Her work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Jenny Lam is a cofounder of Jackson Fish Market, a small software startup focused on making beautiful software experiences that has shipped more than 25 products in the past five years. Their latest product, “A Story Before Bed,” is the first (and only) service that lets parents, grandparents and children record videos of themselves reading children’s books and play them back as often as they like on a Mac, PC or iPad.

Before cofounding Jackson Fish Market, Lam was creative director of the Windows User Experience team at Microsoft from 2001 to 2007, shipping two versions of Windows OS and two versions of MSN Explorer. Shortly after her departure from Microsoft, she held the first ever designer-in-residence position at Ignition Partners Venture Capital, where she advised companies on design strategy.

When she isn’t running her startup, Lam speaks on design at events like An Event Apart, CreativeMornings, Ignite, IxDA and Web 2.0, among others. Currently, she serves as experience director of the AIGA Seattle chapter board of directors. She also mentors national and local organizations like TechStars and Startup Weekend, helping foster the next generation of creative design talent headed for the tech industry and encouraging women in leadership.

With AIGA Seattle, Lam founded and organized the inaugural HIVE conference, which addresses design’s ever-growing role in technology. She raised funding from the most prominent companies in the Pacific Northwest, including Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Ignition Partners.

Lam was named one of the top 100 “Most Influential Women in Technology” by the Puget Sound Business Journal and was awarded Seattle 2.0 Best Startup Designer in 2010.

Kevin Perry is a designer and business professional with more than 13 years of agency experience. He currently drives all resource operations at Struck, an internationally acclaimed digital-forward creative agency headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah whose clients include Nickelodeon, DreamWorks, Sony Pictures, Jack in the Box and Deer Valley Resort. He provides operational expertise to the company and orchestrates the diverse talents of more than 75 creative and strategic experts across the agency’s multiple offices.

Prior to joining Struck, Perry played a major role in establishing and building the Salt Lake City–based firm, Fluid Studio. As creative director, he led the creative vision for the team. He has received awards from major design competitions, including the “AIGA 100 Show.” He continues to design for notable clients including the Utah Arts Festival.

Perry is a past board member and president of the AIGA Salt Lake City chapter. He has served as the chair of the AIGA National Presidents Council and has played an active role with the entire organization for more than 10 years. Perry has chaired two AIGA national leadership retreats, and he is the cofounder of Salt Lake Design Week and the ReVinylize Project. 

Ruki Ravikumar was born and raised in Chennai, India. She has a bachelor’s degree in the history of fine art and drawing and painting from the University of Madras, India, and an MFA in graphic design from Iowa State University. Ravikumar has more than 10 years of experience as a design educator and more than 15 years of experience as a graphic designer, with clients in India, the United Kingdom and the United States. She presently serves as the chairperson and director of graduate programs in design at the University of Central Oklahoma.

Ravikumar has a long history of service to AlGA; she is currently the president of the AlGA Oklahoma chapter and co-chair of the AlGA Design Educators Community steering committee. She has also held the positions of vice president, secretary, treasurer, education chair and communications chair for AlGA Oklahoma.

Ravikumar has won ADDY awards in Oklahoma for her publication and book design work. She is also known for the Design Outreach Workshops she developed in 2008; at that time, they were the only annual workshop opportunity for Oklahoma high school students to learn about graphic and interior design.

Ravikumar’s cross-cultural life and design experience has led her to research, present and publish work that investigates the intersections between graphic design and culture and their impact on design education.

Brian Singer manages the communication design team at Facebook. Prior to Facebook, he founded Altitude, a San Francisco–based creative agency that helps consumer brands engage people through inspiration. At Altitude, he worked on programs with companies such as Apple, Adidas, Chronicle Books and Stanford Lively Arts, among others.

Singer’s work has garnered recognition in Communication Arts, “AIGA 365,” Print, HOW Magazine, Graphis, STEP and AR100; some of his work is also included in the permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA).

Singer is the creator of The 1000 Journals Project, a global art experiment where journals are passed from hand to hand. To date, the journals have traveled to 40 countries and every state in the United States. The project has been covered in The New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, The Wall Street Journal and many other publications, and is the subject of a book and a feature-length documentary by Andrea Kreuzhage. The project was also exhibited at SFMOMA in 2009 and the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles in 2011.

Singer is the former president of the San Francisco chapter of AIGA and has taught in the CCA Extension program and at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. He has also served on the advisory board for the San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery.