Mackey Saturday

Authenticity, simplicity, memorability, clarity.

Once something is fully seen and known, behavior changes without consistent force or intention. Learning requires adaptation when presented new information. Updating beliefs and expressions is a sign of integrity, not weakness. Attention determines what compounds and who you become, ambition only decides what you chase.

@saturday i don't really understand what you mean by this :(

Dynamic Quality

I put together 15 principles of what I think it means to be a great designer. I wanted to summarize 30 years of hard earned lessons and share them with you. Text version in the comments.

Congratulations to the whole Replicate team. Always an exciting moment when a client gets acquired, the work served its purpose well. The bittersweet reality in many cases is it’s the end of its life, happy in this scenario the brand gets to live on.

Compact in form, expanded in content. The original was the final project I worked on with Ivan before he passed. This has 70 or so new logos in it, carrying forward his legacy, continuing to document Tom's 68-year-and-counting career, and many new collaborations as a team. standardsmanual.com/products/ident…

Copenhagen. Too little time. A feeling of home. Design, excellent as a baseline, in service of people. People, caring by nature, in service of design. Thank you.

Life imitates art.

“A logo doesn’t make clear what you do; it makes it clear who you are. The less they say, the better.” An important reminder from one of the most deeply convicted and dedicated graphic designers of all time, Ivan Chermayeff.

It's been a long time coming. Congrats on the public launch @substrate

Change the way someone sees, and they will not forget you.

@zachkrasner Grow up without growing old. You have a great opportunity here.

Funny story, it was one of the first things I wanted to change when I arrived—until I heard the origin story. The founders Arthur and Guillaume and Tim told the story behind it, which is cool: they needed something for their first ever fundraising 2.5 years ago, which was successful, and this original graphic has remained here as a nod to the pure science focus of the early days. $2B of fundraising later, we've grown up a bit more, so probably time to revisit (for better or for worse 🫶)

@jstrelioff @themindcompany @elevateapp @balanceapp @daniellelaroy @Goodside_Studio Thank you for the kind words; all admiration here is due to you. Thank you for putting such high-quality work into the world.

@saturday @themindcompany @elevateapp @balanceapp @daniellelaroy @Goodside_Studio Thank you so much, Mackey! I love your work

*New work* Meet @themindcompany, mental fitness for all. We worked with the team behind @elevateapp & @balanceapp, to create a parent brand name, strategy, visual identity and voice. @daniellelaroy and I loved building this brand at @Goodside_Studio. → goodside.studio/work/the-mind-…

@joonasvirtanen @wabi Excited to see this come into being. “Because we don’t know yet” is a beautiful place to build from. The ideas will come, it will be great to see how you steward them.

we're building @wabi because we believe in a future where software is made for all of us, by all of us. link below! ps. how many internet nostalgia easter eggs can you find? :))

@carlrivera Couple quick BK specific recommendations. @vanschneider @leoportooo @flpr @kellianderson @THEALEXCENTER @youngstownjesse and many, many more I’m missing.

I'm doing a designer dinner in Brooklyn next week on Wednesday. I kept two spots open. Who should I invite?

@vanschneider Clarity in importance of ideas. Clarity in communication skills. Revelation of impact potential. Observations of audience. Understanding of humanity.

As wisdom expands, language contracts.

@soleio May the truth be told.

Damn, Ben. Put this in my eulogy. 🙏

It’s not in response to any recent rebrand, but I’m sure it can apply there also. For me there’s no consistent answer to this situation and it doesn’t have to be so polarizing in outcomes. Early on I do my best to align expectations and communicate clearly that we’re all focused on doing what is best for the company and the situation. If they are incessant on a path, we must find out why. If the reasoning is justified, it’s our responsibility to get great design for that approach/reason. Targets do move sometimes, initial ideas and project desires don’t always hold, so remaining flexible in approach while true to putting the best work we can into the world is a way for us to honor the client + customers (the whole reason the design even exists) and the work itself.

@saturday I assume this is in response to a certain polarizing rebrand posted recently. Curious what you do when your client insists on going down a path that you know isn’t right. Do you agree to part ways, citing creative differences or do you concede and give them what they ask for?

As a studio we put an illogical, and what some may argue is even irresponsible, amount of time and attention on ensuring an identity concept is worth presenting and then presented well. To me, it’s our responsibility to steward these ideas, not just revealing them, but caring for them until they can stand on their own in the world. When an idea is right, we commit to it fully, ensure it’s presented well, giving the respect the idea and the client is due.