The three-peat is on. Following gold medal performances at the Paralympics Tokyo 2020 and Rio 2016, the U.S.A. men's wheelchair basketball team is aiming for a third consecutive triumph at this summer's Paralympic Games in Paris. "We're focused on our goal and going for gold," says head medical support staff Jeremy Johnson (B.F.A. industrial design, 1998). Johnson, an esteemed alum and part of the SCAD industrial design program's first graduating class, knows what can happen when great design, hard work, and athletic excellence all come together.
 
Jeremy Johnson: I was born with what was commonly called clubfoot. I wore a brace my entire childhood. My mom and dad were told I would never be able to run. I pushed myself to where I got a cross-country scholarship in college. At 18, I was living in Savannah and studying sports medicine and lodging with a physician assistant named Mary Vacala who worked with SCAD Athletics. I told Mary that during my spare time I'd set up an athletic training room in Pepe Hall, that way SCAD athletes could come in for preventative and rehab care. I volunteered doing that for a year and then I was asked a very simple question which shocked me: "Hey Jeremy, why don't you come to SCAD on a full scholarship? There's a new major called industrial design…" I spent all my time at SCAD working on healthcare-driven designs. I graduated in 1998 and was handed my diploma by Sidney Poitier. The commencement speaker was Maya Angelou. An incredible experience.
 
After SCAD, I worked in healthcare operations, and gained knowledge and fuel by jumping on committees at the Association for Health Care Resource & Materials Management (AHRMM), which meant powering up overall performance improvement for supply chain performance, service, and product design. The sweet spot for Paralympic wheelchair basketball and supply chain performance improvement teams is tying the work we do on and off the court to what they do on and off the court, so to speak. Recently, I was on multiple projects with Vizient as a consultant, while simultaneously working with the NWBA and Team USA wheelchair basketball. My story aligns with Vizient's values: be inclusive, be purposeful, be bold, and be accountable. The same goes for Team USA wheelchair basketball, with our emphasis on building strong communication, cohesiveness, and character every single day.

Being an athletic trainer and intertwining supply chain operations for over 20 years, I have been able to be part of and help build the best teams in the world. The baton was passed to me about four years ago from head athletic trainer Mary Vacala when Coach Robb Taylor asked me to rise from assistant medical provider to head team provider for the Men’s Wheelchair Basketball Team. We did not miss a beat, traveling to Dubai for the World Championships in 2022 where we won gold. Coaches, support staff, and players — we're all part of the big picture. It's really a family, working together towards a goal. Now we're heading to Paris for the Paralympics. One of the players, Paul Schulte, is a mechanical engineer who designs wheelchairs. I hope Paul and I can visit SCAD so industrial design students can hear our story. Even if we plant a seed for one person, it's worth it. I often reflect and say, how can I impact somebody else? That's why we're here.

When I look back at my SCAD experience, I see where it's gotten me, to the pinnacle of working with Paralympic athletes. We're ready to get out there and bring the gold home for the U.S.A.

Follow Jeremy Johnson and Team USA when the Paralympic basketball tournament opens August 29 at Bercy Arena, the same court where, two weeks prior, LeBron James and Steph Curry will lead USA basketball in their drive towards Olympic gold. 

(As told to Peter Relic.)

"Try to be more like the ground," wrote the poet Rumi in the 13th century, encouraging human connection to the earth. Some eight hundred years later, director, composer, cinematographer and producer Nina Miller (M.F.A., film and television, 2022) uses that Sufi suggestion in her graduate thesis film Invasion of the Bucket Snatchers, this time as a call to action in the present.
 
"The important thing is for the film to help people feel hopeful, connected to the world, and inspired to become involved in composting, and to see that it's a fairly easy thing to do," Miller says.

The wonderfully titled Invasion of the Bucket Snatchers follows Savannah locals and Code of Return Compost proprietors Maria Vaughan and Michael Wedum as they get their hands dirty turning the city's food waste into healthy soil. The loamy labor looks hot and daunting. It is also obviously rewarding and meaningful.

Hard COR: composters Vaughan & Wedum

"There's some lift to it," Miller says of her seven-minute advocacy-based documentary. "Originally, I had planned on showing the whole historical background of the composting movement. Instead, I wound up documenting the composting process start to finish without talking head interviewees."
 
With its rich visual language, the precise, concise film is closer to narrative poetry. (Rumi would approve.) Bucket Snatchers becomes both grander and more intimate when it introduces the Parker family: parents Rodney and Rosa and little girls Rebekah and Rae. At the film's end, a glorious cookout feast features food the homesteaders have grown themselves with compost provided by Michael and Maria. The cycle of life has never looked so sweet.

Like father, like daughter: the Parkers dig in

"Through profiling our neighbors, Nina has created a film that challenges our complacency and invites our immediate community into conversation," says film professor Michael Chaney, who served on Miller's thesis committee. "While she embraces innovative methods of storytelling to target a specific local audience, her film retains the power to generate conversations in other communities facing similar issues."
 
Professor Scott Ballard taught Miller in graduate course Thesis I: Production (FILM 791). "Nina kept an open heart throughout the filmmaking process, and that really helped how she shaped her documentary," Ballard says. "She offers viewers the chance to experience what these people are doing and why, and to gain a feeling for the community that grows from that. You see things differently when you watch her film. She shifts the prism."
 
Nina — a French speaker, acolyte of Octavia E. Butler, and huge fan of Earth, Wind & Fire — is the daughter of SCAD sound design professor Robert Miller. (Her younger sister Lucy is currently a fashion marketing and management student.) Nina's summer plans include traveling to France and Switzerland as cinematographer and field producer on the documentary Lost Snows of the Alps, directed by film professor Kevin McCarey, who — full circle alert — taught Miller in Environmental Filmmaking (FILM 421). "Kevin's really taken me under his wing and helped me understand the wide range of possibilities in environmental filmmaking," Nina says.
 
After local screenings at Front Porch Improv, Invasion of the Bucket Snatchers has found a home online at Beyond the Short, where it can be streamed for free. Prepare to be more like the ground.

Connect with filmmaker Nina Miller!

All images courtesy Nina Miller.

Get ready for a fête to never forget! This Thursday, June 20 at SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film in Atlanta, delight in the opening evening reception for Entering Modernity: 1920s Fashion from the Parodi Costume Collection. While period dress is not required, there will be no mistaking who's got the look.

The exhibition features more than 60 works by designers who embraced the era's ethos of experimentation with convention-defying artistry. Entering Modernity highlights the styles and silhouettes that came to define one of the most revolutionary periods in fashion history. The exhibition is curated exclusively for SCAD FASH by Francisca Parodi, founder of the Parodi Costume Collection, and Gonzalo Parodi, director of the Parodi Costume Collection, in partnership with Rafael Gomes, creative director of SCAD FASH museums.
 
“One century later, these culturally important garments continue to resonate and inspire," said SCAD President Paula Wallace. “Entering Modernity brings the radical world of the Jazz Age to glittering, glamorous life only at SCAD FASH. Visitors will be dazzled by evening wear and accessories fit for a night at Gatsby's from legendary designers Paul Poiret, Madeleine Vionnet, Jeanne Lanvin, and Jean Patou. This summer, make your way to SCAD FASH for an unforgettable journey back to the Roaring Twenties!"
 
Ushered in by the postwar boom of economic prosperity and freshly won freedoms, the Roaring '20s were marked by glitz, glamor, and radical social and sartorial transformations. Following the global upheavals of the First World War and the suffrage movement, the women of the 1920s embraced new careers, new experiences, and new attires — no longer bound by the rigid conventions and wardrobes of their 19th-century forebearers. Marked by elevated thinking as much as excess, the Jazz Age would forever change how women dressed, behaved, and expressed themselves.
 
Emphasizing the richness of materials and garment construction, Entering Modernity offers a glittering showcase of defining 1920s styles, from the newly introduced cocktail dress with its sleek layers and drop waist hem to other relaxed silhouettes designed for movement. Among the many expertly preserved and rarely seen haute couture works from the archive of the Parodi Costume Collection, the exhibition spotlights Madeleine Vionnet's Flame Dress, Jeanne Lanvin's Robe de Style, a wedding gown by Paul Poiret, a cocktail dress by Jean Patou, and other signature looks by Mariano Fortuny and Henriette Negrin, among others.

Madeleine Vionnet, Flame Dress, Spring/Summer 1923, France, pink silk moiré dress with dark pink velvet flame appliquéw motif and gold metallic embroidery. Courtesy of the Parodi Costume Collection.

“This collaboration between SCAD FASH and the Parodi Costume Collection is the ideal combination of archival depth, excellent scholarship, and discerning curation supporting education," said Gonzalo Parodi, Director of the Parodi Costume Collection. “As a university museum, SCAD FASH is the ultimate environment to promote exchange on the origins of modernity in fashion. Together, we aimed at a deeper narrative that exposes the evolution and complexities of garment design beyond conventional representations of the decade. We are honored to present the result of our dialogue in this exhibition."
 
Thursday's intimate members preview will include a gallery conversation between SCAD professor Sarah Collins and Gonzalo Parodi delving into the decade's sartorial innovations and contemporary efforts to preserve fashion history.
 
“We are honored to collaborate with the prestigious Parodi Costume Collection, an institution dedicated to fashion conservation, archiving, and education," said Rafael Gomes, Creative Director for SCAD FASH Museums. “The 1920s are one of the most illustrious decades, and SCAD FASH is thrilled to bring such important works of couture from names forever linked with the period, including Paul Poiret, Madeleine Vionnet, and Jeanne Lanvin, for our students and guests to learn from these iconic works of fashion history."
 
Entering Modernity: 1920s Fashion from the Parodi Costume Collection is on view June 21–Aug. 25, 2024, at SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film in Atlanta. For more information, visit scadfash.org.

Sweating and smiling, with traffic swirling around him, Sheroy Balsara navigates Mumbai's maelstrom on a bicycle laden with lunch boxes. As part of his thesis research, the graduate student has gone to work among the estimated five thousand deliverymen known in India as the dabbawala.

"Growing up in Mumbai, I've always seen them moving, lifting, delivering," says Balsara (M.F.A. industrial design). "They are the heartbeat of the city."
 
In a tradition dating back 130 years, the dabbawala deliver home-cooked meals across Mumbai, serving an astonishing 50-mile radius utilizing rail transport and bicycle. "They represent not only themselves but their community," Balsara says. "They work on trust, and everyone trusts them."

To document his day as a trainee, Balsara created the four-minute film "Dabbawala – Men on a Mission." "It was not enough for me to simply see their challenges, I had to face the challenges of the dabbawala by becoming one myself."

On a mission: Balsara (left) and Babaji.

As proof of primary research, "Dabbawala – Men on a Mission" is genuinely impressive. As a short film, it's a five-star delight. With his toothy grin and white Gandhi cap, Sheroy is a natural leading man, interviewing cycling activist Vijay Malhotra, supply chain expert Dr. Pawan Agrawal, and president of the Dabbawala Mumbai, Ramdas Karwande. Then there is Babaji, the dabbawala who mentors Sheroy in managing heavy loads against a ticking clock. As Sheroy says: "There's someone out there waiting for their food and if you are late, they don't eat."
 
Balsara has spent this academic year back in Savannah, addressing the significant challenges faced by the dabbawala in his master's thesis "Optimizing Tiffin Transport: Enhancing Efficiency and Ergonomics for Dabbawalas."
 
"Sheroy demonstrates how thoughtful design can empower local communities, and his project seeks to modernize a vital service," says industrial design professor Jr Neville Songwe, who taught Balsara in courses including Visual Communication and Presentation (SDES 501) and Entrepreneurship for Designers (IDUS 733). "He exemplifies the SCAD ethos of using design to create real-world solutions and our commitment to innovation and cultural sensitivity in addressing community-specific challenges."
 
Professor William Woods, chair of Balsara's thesis committee, says he has "no doubt that Sheroy's designs will be just as impressive as his research — rooted in a deep sense of responsibility for the dabbawalla and their work."

Here comes a delivery: Balsara and the dabbawala of Mumbai.

Some background on Balsara: the left-hander, Zoroastrian, and Lewis Hamilton fan earned his degree in electrical engineering at NIT Rourkela (India) before enrolling in the online platform SCADnow in 2020. Arriving in Savannah in fall 2021, he began in-person studies while working as a guide at SCADstory. He has participated in SCADpro projects with Apple and Movado — experiences he deems "essential" — and served as a graduate mentor. He praises the faculty and facilities in the Gulfstream Center for accelerating his growth in Rhino 3D design and CAD modeling and as a craftsman with shop tools. "SCAD makes you feel part of something big," he says. "The culture that the college has created focuses on the positive."
 
In the coming months, Balsara will reveal his design solution for the dabbawala. "My focus is on the guy on the bicycle. How can I make what's tough easier? My design should adapt to the dabbawala, as opposed to them adapting to the design. My design has to bring in a new revenue stream for them. I am trying to make their life better."
 
As his thesis chair William Woods says: "With the right influence, Sheroy's project can easily go from theoretical to actually changing people's lives."

Connect with Sheroy Balsara.

On a bustling Friday night at Bar Del Monte in Washington D.C., furniture designer Griffin Feeney's handiwork is in full effect: cherry wood chairs and a double-sided banquette teem with patrons enjoying Cantabrian anchovies and Neapolitan pizzas on white marble-topped tables. The new, already-feted Italian restaurant owned by Oliver Pastan, Bar Del Monte is a welcome addition to Mount Pleasant's food scene, and represents the stunning transformation of what was formerly a grimy garage.
 
"It was a pit," says Feeney (B.F.A. industrial design, 2019) with a chuckle. "They kept the bones [of the structure], otherwise it required a total excavation. I was there looking at the site since day one, trying to figure out where everything was going to go." While Pastan employed Feeney's younger brother Aidan's welding and metalwork expertise, Griffin began designing the restaurant's furniture and sourcing the wood.
 
"There was a four-month period when they had to get the flooring in, drywall, studs, everything," Griffin says. "During that time, I was prototyping tables, working on designs with Oliver, discussing details and different sizes. I convinced him to go with cherry wood because it has so much warmth and character. It was a really good experience on the first commercial job I've ever done."

Double-sided banquette, designed, built and installed by Griffin Feeney. Bar Del Monte, Washington, D.C.

A native of Tenleytown, Northwest D.C., Griffin attended Woodrow Wilson High School (now Jackson-Reed High) and took robotics classes as a kid. "I grew up with power tools in my hands in my father's shop, and I was always a fan of engineering and the arts. My mother suggested looking at colleges with industrial design programs. As soon as we visited Savannah, it was sunny and there were smiles everywhere, good vibes, and my choice to go to SCAD was made."
 
As an undergraduate, Feeney hunkered down in the Gulfstream Center for Design, home to SCAD's industrial design and furniture design programs. "Between the metal shop and the wood shop and the areas for 3D printing and laser cutting — oh, to have those resources under one roof again," Feeney says with affection. Professor emeritus John Pierson proved a big influence ("I learned about joinery in his Shaker table class"), as did industrial design professor William Woods. In Woods' course Model and Prototype Development (IDUS 212), Feeney built a dovetailed tea box, earning his professor's regard.
 
"Griffin's creative work is rooted in his eye for stunning materials, and he brings his designs fully to life with his hands and a few tools," says Woods. "Everything will eventually go 'out of style' except craftmanship, and Griffin is an excellent example of what great craftsmanship truly means."
 
Feeney's tea box caught the eye of David Colas (B.F.A. furniture design, 2012), who invited Griffin to visit Colas Modern, the woodworking shop and retail showroom in Savannah. "I was still a student when I met David and Lara Colas and they hired me on the spot," Griffin recalls. "I worked at Colas Modern for two years, doing everything with them in that shop. We built cabinets and cutting boards. David showed me round all the different makers and markets in Savanah and how he operates, and markets and sells his products. I absorbed a lot from him."
 
Colas, a renowned furniture designer and entrepreneur, admires Feeney for his deep respect for the artistry of woodworking. "Griffin fit right in during his time at Colas Modern," David says. "His passion for design and high-quality craftsmanship mirrors my own principles, and his relentless work ethic and sharp wit made him a joy to work with. Griffin's impact as a woodworker will continue to be marked by his dedication to excellence."
 
Enriched by these experiences, Feeney returned home to D.C. in 2021 to develop Feeney Furniture, making one-off custom dining tables and drafting desks before going to work on Bar Del Monte.
 
"By the time we finished the Bar Del Monte project, I had changed my mind about where I want to go with my work and my business," Griffin says. Two commercial projects now beckon: a restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue, and a brewery in nearby Maryland. Meanwhile at Bar Del Monte, as the savory main course gives way to panforte with a nip of sweet wine, the pitched back angle of the Feeney-design banquette comes in handy.
 
"I love that I can make my mark on my city," Griffin says, "and I love bringing my friends and family here to enjoy it."

Griffin Feeney at work. Photo: Niko Bartash

"We like to say we build fans and our fans are our biggest sellers," said amika creative director Matthew Stetson, referring to his haircare company’s devotees, during a panel at SCADstyle 2024. With its "retro-modern" aesthetic, amika has seen exponential recent growth, though the brand has been around for nearly a decade and a half. "It’s become this community that’s bigger than just one product or one piece of content or one product launch," Stetson added.

Centerstage before a SCAD MOA theater audience of mostly (but not only!) business of beauty and fragrance and LXFM students, Stetson was joined in conversation by Glossier’s chief creative officer Marie Suter for Beauty Ritual: The New Chemistry of Branding, hosted by SCAD chair Dominica Baird. Over a good-natured, fast-flowing hour, they discussed topics including social media scrapes, brick-and-mortar retail, and the astonishing quantity of assets needed to launch even a single product.

Baird, previously Global Director of Trends and Digital Innovation at Maybelline (L'Oréal), asked a key question: "How do you get people to grow with you as a brand?"

Suter, who has led visual strategy at Glossier, Inc. since 2018, referenced the brand's original vision , which means "staying who you are and not shifting through trends."

Glossier's Marie Suter breaks it down.

"Because of the way Glossier started [in 2014, as an offshoot of the blog Into the Gloss by Emily Weiss] and the way it has changed the industry, there is truly the potential for it to be a lasting iconic brand," Suter continued. "[We have] the aspiration of a hundred-year brand that’s created in true belief and emotion rather than just to sell products and make money."

Stetson agreed. "We never wanted to be a trend-based brand," he said. "At our core, much like Glossier, we are our people. Anyone who uses amika products, they really love them. People come up to me: ‘I love the masks! I love the dry shampoo! I love the scent!’ For campaigns we do our model-casting in that community. Not only are we hiring people who represent the brand but they’re super passionate about the product. That’s important because it builds authenticity — not just about the brand, but among the community themselves."

Both Stetson and Suter emphasized that their brands are not chasing the Gen Z demographic, or any age range for that matter; the in-common development strategy is to appeal across multiple generations.

"We never feel like we’re talking to a single audience," Suter said. "It’s more of a sentiment. It’s more valid, the sentiment you want to be part of, than being a certain age. There is a passion at a younger age for beauty that Glossier is very well-positioned for, because it’s not heavy makeup, it’s very easy. Yet we have an array of product—we have skin care, we have body, we have perfume—that allows for a wider range of potential generations."

Stetson nodded. "From the beginning, amika’s tagline has been ‘All Hair is Welcome.’ It’s not about age, it’s not about a hair type, it’s about this is what I need for my hair at this time in my life, and that changes, just like skin care."

Baird facilitated a round of questions from students in the audience. Vibes were high. Everyone left with beauty brand wisdom, and as a fan of SCADstyle 2024.

Thanks to everyone who came out fror SCADstyle 2024!

"We disagree on a lot of things, and I think that's good," said Danial Aitouganov, nodding towards his zomer co-founder Imruh Asha, seated beside him on the stage of the SCAD MOA theater. "We make a point to always speak to each other with respect," Asha added, grinning. "That's because you know I'm sensitive," Aitouganov replied.
 
Funny, friendly, focused, and foregrounding their inextricable personal and professional connection, the conversation between Aitouganov (gold tooth, green slippers) and Asha (red vest, smoky glasses) at SCADstyle 2024 drew a full house of students from degree programs including fashion, fibers, and luxury and brand management.
 
Hosted by Family Style founder and Editor-in-Chief Joshua Glass, the talk—titled "Party People: Feeding the Fantasy"—covered topics ranging from deadstock fabric to TikTok trends and the value of going to museums with friends. Glass began by drawing out details from the friendship between Aitouganov and Asha, which began in Amsterdam, where Danial attended art school and Imruh worked as a stylist, before they relocated to Paris and founded their brand.
 

Zomer wowed with at Paris Fashion Week in September 2023, when Aitouganov and Asha sent their mini-me doppelgangers cavorting down the runway in their debut collection. (Doubling down, they also dressed childhood lookalikes of Anna Wintour and Grace Coddington as part of an entire campaign.) Glass expressed admiration that explosive interest has fortified the founders' principles.

"We are always looking for a balance between conceptual and commercial," Aitouganov said. "When we think of our customer we wonder, what would she wear? You need to say something with your clothes." Added Asha: "It's an ongoing conversation."
 
As an experiential lifestyle brand, zomer (Dutch for "summer") delivers garments that radiate positivity, humor and joy. Detachable flaps feature. They are not afraid of polka dots.
 
"When you put out your great first collection, then everyone's like, What's next?" Glass said, while pointing out that zomer is already designing for Spring/Summer 2025.
 
Aitouganov and Asha mentioned a potential future foray into menswear, and the importance of celebrating success amidst the rush, noting two early high water marks: having zomer carried at Bergdorf Goodman, and Bjork wearing their one-off wood sculpture dress onstage.
 
Glass nudged them to offer tips to SCAD students preparing senior thesis collections.

Stylish SCADstyle souls (l-r): Glass, Aitouganov and Asha. 

"This is the time for you to dive into your own desires and really have fun with it," said Aitouganov. "Your graduation year is like the last year when you can really be yourself, because once you go into the industry, you will work for a creative director and you will work with someone else's vision. It's always super important to have a personal subject. You need to be happy with your collection."
 
"Having peers around you that you can talk about what matters to you is really important," Asha said. "Meeting people with the same values is important, and art school makes it easier to create that network."
 
"We took the SCAD tour yesterday and I wish I was here, guys, this school is amazing," Aitouganov said. "We were talking in the green room that maybe we should take a course here at SCAD," added Asha with an awed nod.
 
The students cheered this suggestion wildly, the theater as vibrant as a zomer collection.

"Savannah is special," says Ellie Isaacs (B.F.A., historic preservation, 2014) as she settles in at a chic coffeeshop on the former site of a dry cleaners on Whitaker Street. "It's absolutely changed in the ten years since I graduated. There's been a lot of development, changes in the landscape, more hotels, and successful projects like Plant Riverside that have revitalized downtown and River Street."

Meeting Isaacs at a repurposed location feels appropriate. She is the new Director of Preservation and Historic Properties at the Historic Savannah Foundation (HSF), the nonprofit cultural institution dedicated, per its mission statement, to "saving the buildings, places and stories that define Savannah's past, present and future." As HSF CEO and President Sue Adler said of Isaacs: "Her passion, expertise and leadership will usher in a new era of historic preservation here in Savannah."

Call it the Ellie era. A SCAD-bred superstar, Isaacs earned minors in architectural history and interior design and was the only undergraduate presenter at the National Trust for Historic Preservation's PastForward conference in 2014. After graduation, she worked for an architecture firm in Hot Springs, Arkansas before returning to Savannah, where she joined Lominack Kolman Smith Architects as historic preservation specialist, and more recently served as Chair of the Savannah Historic District Board of Review and as a member of HSF's Architectural Review Committee.

"Ellie's bona fides go a long way to ensuring the integrity of Savannah as a historic city with evolving civic obligations," says SCAD professor of architecture and Savannah Tourism Advisory Council member Ryan Madson.

In 2023, Isaacs was invited by preservation design professor Sabrinna Cox to mentor SCAD students, conducting class critiques and giving personalized feedback on projects.

"Ellie showed our students that it is possible to create your own path in the preservation field, and to influence how the field is defined," says Cox. "Our students were able to see how the strength of her commitment at the local level can help set preservation trends statewide and even nationally, which will be an added dividend of her new role at HSF."

As an alumni mentor, Isaacs spoke to students about the realities of working in preservation, which are not always "bright and fuzzy," she says. "Sometimes things you plan don't happen and you lose buildings, or people don't have funds and projects have to be done in phases."

Pragmatic idealism suits her new position. Isaacs is responsible for overseeing HSF initiatives including the Preservation Easement Program and Revolving Fund, purchasing historic properties and selling them on to preservation-minded buyers. She will also work in partnership with the City of Savannah, Chatham County government, and neighborhood associations to save and adaptively use historic buildings.

"Preservation is multi-faceted, which for a long time has not been fully understood," Isaacs says, mentioning the new HSF advocacy strategy to better engage Savannahians on social media. "Preservation is about more than a building or a place, it's about the people who lived there, it's about equity in housing, and a focus on underrepresented stories."

Isaacs orders her coffee to-go, since her afternoon will continue with meetings back at the HSF headquarters on Columbia Square. She notes that the nonprofit organization, which was founded in 1955, has achieved a historic symmetry in 2024. "Historic Savannah Foundation was started by seven women who saved the Davenport House, and in 2024 we now have seven women managing both HSF and the Davenport House."

As the new Director of Preservation and Historic Properties says: "Every building has a story and every building has a soul!"

Connect with Ellie Isaacs.

"If I wasn’t certain that it would make me unemployable, I would definitely only design in green," wrote Aarushi Menon during her junior year at SCAD in 2022. Reminded of that claim now, the freelance designer at mighty book publisher Penguin Random House cracks up, pointing to her recent "divorce" from the color that once dominated her work.

In shocking pinks and riotous reds, Menon’s iterative designs for the forthcoming Elizabeth Agyemang novel Heart-Shaped Lies (Delacorte Press, 2024) demonstrate her commitment to excellence across the chromatic spectrum. Such diversity was inevitable in Menon’s daily operation.

Unsued design outtake for a book by Penguin Random House author Elizabeth Agyemang. 

"I’m designing all day on InDesign and Photoshop while everyone else does the hard work of production coordinating," Aarushi says with affection for her PRH colleagues. "When I’m doing book cover designs and I’m not able to figure something out, I’ll still throw green on it and then I’m like, Okay, now I can see where things are supposed to be!" 

Less than twelve months after graduating from SCAD, Menon (B.F.A., graphic design, 2023) has received the IDA Emerging Graphic Designer of the Year Award. She has also gotten nods from World Brand Design Society, Young Ones TDC, and GDUSA. As the trophies and books begin to compete for space on her mantlepiece, she looks back at where she was just a few years ago.

"I found out about SCAD from a visiting recruiter while I was a secondary student at Garden International School in Kuala Lumpur," she says. "I came to Savannah to study illustration because I wanted to draw children’s books." That trajectory changed when she learned about photography and typography as graphic design elements. "The variety helped keep me motivated, and I switched majors."

Professor Stuart Fano taught Menon in major curriculum course Production for Print and Digital Environments (GRDS 358). "Aarushi brought a keen problem-solving intelligence and attention to detail to each of her projects," he says. "She displayed a passionate curiosity that resulted in excellent work that raised the standard in the whole class. I’m so pleased to see she is already having a positive impact and meeting with success in such a distinguished industry."

Menon remembers "loving the analog feeling" of bookmaking in Fano’s class. Tactility inspired her Unsplash and Texturelabs-assisted "365-Day Poster Design Challenge" project, which impressed her senior designers at Penguin Random House. It helped that her portfolio included speculative covers for Colin Dickey books including Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places (Viking, 2016) that she developed while taking Typography II: Information and Media (GRDS 353) with graphic design professor Michael Whitney.

"Aarushi was an exceptional student," says professor Whitney. "Her use of type is at a very high level, as is her ability to prototype physical mockups of project finals. She now volunteers to speak to my Portfolio groups via Zoom, and is inspirational to them." 

A commitment to coaching and guidance dates to Menon's time at SCAD as a peer tutor at the Jen Library's drop-in resource center. "Being an international student myself helped me better understand the challenges of written communication for students who might not speak English as their first language," says the native of India.

That dedication to effective communication manifests in her professional process, and the fact that designing a book cover starts with the manuscript. "You read, you take notes, you highlight quotes that are visually evocative, and then you get to the sketching phase," Menon explains. "Sometimes sketching is not taking out a pen and paper and drawing, it’s sewing and pasting, or gathering images onto a Photoshop board and experimenting."

Aarushi started at Penguin Random House in 2023 executing mechanicals ("you pick up a front cover from another designer and do the spine and the back cover") for imprints including Hogarth and Del Rey, understanding the art direction ecosystem, and gradually receiving more cover assignments.

"I’ve learned a lot about the processes that go into making a book cover from [senior designer] Cassie Gonzales and other amazing designers at PRH. There is a significant amount of practical reasoning that has to do with genre and content that decides the aesthetic before you even start on a cover. You’re conveying something about not only a specific moment or event that’s described in the book, but about the overall messaging that the author is trying to impart."

Menon’s excellence may help explain why, as she says, "The desire for physical books has had such a resurgence in my generation."

Connect with Aarushi Menon!

"If we don't have experimentation, we don't have a way to learn," says Shalom Volchok (B.F.A., graphic design, 2001). "If user metrics don't improve, it doesn't matter what we think of the design."

Make no mistake: Volchok is a lover of beautiful design. As CEO of optimization platform Outsmartly, he is devoted to building technology that drives conversion. His essential question: "How do we push ecommerce further?"

Volchok founded Outsmartly with CFO Emily Adler in 2020, their tagline promising "50x growth potential for Shopify stores at 100x less cost." For online merchants who use Shopify, Outsmartly has become an indispensable tool to help grow, manage, and scale up a business. (Shopify itself has praised Outsmartly's role in the ten-million-sold success of the portable BlendJet blender. That's beaucoup smoothies.)

"Shalom has a pedigree that is different than most," says Ray Crowell, managing director of the SCADpro Fund, the university's alumni start-up investment arm. "His ability to optimize performance for other companies demonstrates the business-model relevancy of Outsmartly. His focus and self-awareness make him an ideal mentor for SCAD students."

Outsmartly CEO Shalom Volchok.

The "many years" of tech-building that Volchok mentions are real. After graduating from SCAD in 2001, he revolutionized his parents' direct-to-consumer company Blessed Herbs, designing all its packaging and marketing, creating an ecommerce strategy, and turning it into an online sales juggernaut. The keys were analytics and A-B testing, two approaches he is refining towards perfection with Outsmartly.

"When a consumer comes to an ecommerce website, that site needs creativity, it needs beauty, it needs design, it needs function, and all that needs to serve a purpose," he says. "By pulling data together, we can manage the levers that are going to drive profitability and the growth of the business."

Volchok excels at explaining business concepts according to his audience. It's hard to imagine anyone more enthusiastically unpacking the challenges of integrating on-site advertising and inventory management. "Paid advertising is probably one of the things that's nearest and dearest to me," he says with a grin.

His appearances on Cloudflare TV and JAMstack go neck-deep in tech-speak, yet they reveal an essential truth: Shalom is an excellent communicator. As he says, "If we don't talk, nothing moves."

Shalom attributes his commitment to effective communication in part to his "intensely isolated" home-schooled childhood. He says he lacked proper peer socialization until arriving at SCAD, where he remembers being "hypercompetitive" and finding success as a member of the SCAD men's golf team. (Volchok was a nationally rated player under Coach Fred Fruisen.)

In turn, communication is the key to Shalom managing his own workforce. "The best people want to do what needs to be done and do it right. The challenge is, how do you get those things to happen together, where it provides a lot of value to the individual, and significant value to the company?"

Backed by SCADpro Fund, Volchok will return as a mentor this year at SCAD. "I love SCAD," he says. "Savannah remains dear to my heart." And for many fully optimized years to come.

   Connect with Shalom Volchok.