Brayan Montes-Terrazas was part of the inspiration track at the 2024 HOW Design Live Conference in Denver, Colorado. Going under his art name of YAMZ World of Color, his work truly is an inspiration. We talk about how choosing yourself in your creative work can only be good, the path to becoming a full-time illustrator, merch, and more.

Enjoy.

Once again, thanks to the team at HOW on a great conference. This is the last of our recordings from the 2024 event, and for those that missed any, we had three daily recaps:

• HOW Design Live 2024, Conference Recap 1 of 3 : Debbie Millman
• HOW Design Live 2024, Conference Recap 2 of 3 : Amy Conover, Darcy Hinrichs, Anne Hughes, Erin Pille, Keith Smith, Jason Wedekind
• HOW Design Live 2024, Conference Recap 3 of 3 : Aaron Draplin, Bill Gardner, Stephen Gates, Rick Griffith

As well as eight interviews (which includes this one):

• Alex Center: The Reflex Blue Show #262
• Rachel Mae Zeolla: The Reflex Blue Show #263
• Brandi Parker: The Reflex Blue Show #264
• Pum Lefebure: The Reflex Blue Show #265
• The Bill & Von Show (Bill Gardner and Von Glitschka): The Reflex Blue Show #266
• Carissa Carter & Scott Doorley: The Reflex Blue Show #267
• Tegan Harcourt: The Reflex Blue Show #268
• Brayan Montes-Terrazas: The Reflex Blue Show #269

This was my thirteenth HOW Conference (the first being the 2009 event in Austin, Texas), and I cannot say how much of an impact it has had on me – the friends and memories I have made over the years at this wonderful event, the numerous speakers I have had the opportunity to podcast with, the events that surround the conference, and so much more. This month, they posted on their website, “We have made the difficult decision to postpone HOW Design LIVE, including the 2025 event. While we recognize this may cause inconvenience, this decision enables us to better align with the evolving industry landscape and focus on creating an even more impactful and valuable experience for our community in the future. Thank you for supporting HOW Design Live and its community over the past 35 years.” I do hope to see this event again, but I also know that the community that it created will remain for a long time.

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Tegan Harcourt, Director at maslansky+partners, was at the 2024 HOW Design Live Conference in Denver, Colorado to give her talk, “Stop Vacuum Strategies: How to Ask The Right Questions and Give Your Audience A Seat At The Table”.

We sit down to chat about Coke 2, keeping your audience at the top of mind, working at a language strategy firm (and what a language strategy firm is), using language and message in different languages and locations, and more.

Enjoy.

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Carissa Carter and Scott Doorley of the Stanford d.school were at the 2024 HOW Design Live Conference in Denver, Colorado to talk about their new book – Assembling Tomorrow: A Guide to Designing a Thriving Future. As the most recent book from the d.school, this one (which I finished reading last weekend), is what I would expect from two people from Stanford – it’s smart, thought-provoking, and takes a unique approach I have not seen in a design book before. Besides being a beautiful design, it mixes a lot of non-fiction with what they call ’20 speculative non-fiction stories’ in-between (you know, stories from up to 90 years in the future presented as real). I will say I have already found myself talking to multiple people about some of the topics I read in the book – I highly recommend it.

We talk about the book; The Shop at Matter bookstore; the Stanford d.school; the nature of design work as well as the unintended consequences; and more.

Enjoy.

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When you see Bill Gardner and Von Glitschka, you know it’s a HOW Design Live to remember! Recorded during the second day of the 2024 event in Denver, we sat down to talk about the pressing matters of the day in the design world…

…I mean, we talked about how great Macromedia Freehand was (I mean, is, as Bill still has a working copy of this program somehow) for basically the entire first segment of the show. I cannot overstate how happy this made me.

We also talk about Vons workshop showcasing his vector skills in Adobe Illustrator; Bill’s upcoming book; Bill’s talk on the yearly LogoLounge trend report; both of their LinkedIn Learning courses; and more.

Enjoy.

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Pum Lefebure meets up with The Reflex Blue Show while at the 2024 HOW Design Live conference in Denver, Colorado. We talk about her talk on designing for impact and action, knowing your super power, learning AI prompts, and more.

Enjoy.

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Brandi Parker, Founder and Brand-Level Sustainability Consultant of Parker Brands, meets up with The Reflex Blue Show while at the 2024 HOW Design Live conference in Denver, Colorado.

We talk about Brandi and Fe Amarante‘s conference opening talk on the sustainability of ourselves – as well as spending the night before hand painting (and mis-spelling) all new slides. We also speak about how every budget can also be seen as an ask for resources – through the Earth or ourselves, and the importance of work/life balance.

We also talk about the Zero Waste Creatives podcast hosted by Brandi and Fe, working in sustainability, getting a .eco domain, and more.

Enjoy.

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Rachel Mae Zeolla, Creative Director at NBCUniversal, meets up with The Reflex Blue Show while at the 2024 HOW Design Live conference in Denver, Colorado.

We talk about her being eaten by a shark on The Last Sharknado: It’s About Time (I have been fortunate to have a LOT of great guests on the show over the years, but still get amazed by the things people get to do in this profession, and this one is just cool), Chucky, Suits, Wynonna Earp, Hacks, her talk at HOW about fandom and how to use marketing to tap into it, how a musical theatre background helps in marketing, and more.

Enjoy.

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Alex Center meets up with The Reflex Blue Show while at the 2024 HOW Design Live conference in Denver, Colorado (I should mention that his company Center did the branding for this year’s event as well). We talk about his decade of doing design for Coca-Cola, starting his design career as an intern for The New York Knicks, and even getting to meet 50 Cent while working on an ad for VitaminWater. We also talk about his own podcast, Front and Center.

Enjoy.

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Aaron Draplin stops by, I mean, more like I crashed his merch booth in the lobby to talk to him about closing down the 2024 HOW Design Live in Denver. And wow, that merch table has grown over the years to truly be a sight to behold.

After that, I speak with Stephen Gates about his talk, which was followed by an immediate, and basically unplanned, open Q&A chat – maybe next year he’ll finally bring that band he works with to HOW as well.

And on the other side of the lobby, I find Rick Griffith near the pop-up bookstore run by, well, his bookstore. I will say, I was very happy to see a bookstore return to the conference, and such a well curated one at that. It was also worth the walk to the actual store the day before.

And that wraps up – wait, one more, very brief cameo to close down the daily recaps from Bill Gardner, who celebrated his birthday in Denver by giving his yearly LogoLounge Trend Report.

Recorded on September 25, 2024 in the lobby of the Ellie Caulkins Opera House during the final day of 2024’s HOW Design Live. I recorded eight podcasts while there, and they will be released over the next few months.

Enjoy.

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Amy Conover, HOW Design’s Brand and Content Director; show attendees, and fellow Omaha area designers Anne Hughes and Erin Pille; HOW Ambassadors Keith Smith and Darcy Hinrichs; and Jason Wedekind of Genghis Kern discuss the first two days of another incredible conference.

Big thanks to the Letterpress Depot for letting me record from their booth in the exhibit hall, where they were printing posters for attendees, as well as promoting “The Letterpress Depot: a living museum of letterpress printing, typography, design, poetry and art.” And a huge thanks to HOW for once again having me out to record podcasts during the event.

Recorded on September 24, 2024 in the Seawell Ballroom during the closing reception of HOW Design Live –  which is just over 2/3 of the way through the program itself, so there is still a lot of HOW to cover, and we will be back later this week with our final recap.

Enjoy.

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Debbie Millman joined me backstage just as the 2024 HOW Design Live was starting up. We talk about The Shop at Matter, her upcoming book, “Love Letter to a Garden“, breaking the elevator at the San Francisco Sterling Brands office within minutes of when we first met, podcasting for almost 20 years, and more.

Recorded on September 23, 2024 in the Ellie Caulkins Opera House. Moving HOW Design Live to a creative venue was one that was a a big hit – seeing the main stage speakers in an Opera House really added to the creativity and inspiration of the event – one I would love to see continued.

As usual, the speakers were great (Debbie helps with selection of a number of them, which we also discuss), being in Denver is always a week to remember, and I can’t wait to see what next year brings. Until then, I will be back this week with two more daily recaps, and will finish off Season 17 with eight podcasts recorded during the event.

Still can’t believe that Design Matters is going to be 20 in February, as it also reminds me of my own podcasting beginnings later that year…

Enjoy.

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