Designer as Author

Not all thesis projects become actual products, but many have. For his thesis project Bobby Martin Jr., class of 2003, rebranded the Abyssinian Baptist Church of Harlem and built a campaign advertising positive images in the African-American community. His poster campaign covered 35 billboards throughout central Harlem for five months.

Inspire: poster designed by Bobby Martin

Deborah Adler, class of 2002, redesigned prescription bottles for her thesis project, Safe RX. During the summer between her first and second years of study Adler considered ideas about Holocaust education projects or projects about the cultural influences behind curly hair. Then, during the fall semester, her grandmother took her grandfather's medication by mistake, and Adler realized that hard-to-read prescription labels had caused the problem. As she researched the problem, she found that 60% of Americans don't take the proper medications because of confusion over prescription labels. As a designer from a family of physicians, Adler felt this might be her way to contribute to the field of medicine. Her thesis project included a complete packaging system with a redesigned bottle in a D-shape, rather than a cylinder, a label with the drug name prominently positioned at the top printed in separate colors for each member of the family, and an information card with the intake schedule. The labels and packaging were designed with Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop as well as Adobe fonts.

While researching ways to take her idea to market she found that her best prospects for adoption were through a national pharmacy. She protected her idea with a patent, and began patiently to contact various national firms. She always felt that her concept was a good fit for Target, a company with a focus on community involvement and a commitment to design as a way of differentiating itself. In August 2004, Target decided to adopt the idea and quickly assembled a team, including Adler, to bring it to market, in total a nine-month process. Adler worked with Klaus Rosburg, a Brooklyn-based industrial designer hired by Target, to refine her concept for its pharmacies. The two created a new bottle shape that stands on its round childproof cap designed to facilitate reading. As in her proposal, the labels list the drug name at the top, followed by intake instructions and then doctor name and refill options, with the Target pharmacy name at the bottom. A card on the common uses and side effects of the drug is tucked behind the label. The pharmacies provide six colored rubber rings that attach to the neck of the standard bottle so that each member of the family has a unique color for their personal medications. Adler also redesigned the graphical warning symbols to be more intuitive. The result of the test is Target's new ClearRX prescription system.

Creating content that communicates

Whether creating ideas like Safe RX, consumer products, publications, or services, SVA graduates in design learn how to focus a concept, research their materials and markets, and define their customers. They develop a business plan and a prototype as a part of their thesis. They exhibit their concepts both physically and online. Some of them take their thesis projects directly to market, and some apply their learning to better serving their future clients. All of them learn what it takes to become the creators, as well as the communicators, of content.