The Museum of the City of New York is a small museum with a large mandate—it is the keeper of the history of New York City and State history. Every year it hosts NYC history day as part of the national history day campaign. While working with MSDS, I designed a campaign to encourage participation amongst teachers and students. The campaign comprised an identity, save-the-date postcard, an invitation to the event, and then various items of signage and leaflets for the award-ceremony itself.

In order to ensure that this event stood out from the usual pile of literature in teachers inboxes I designed the pieces to be highly eye-catching and memorable. A graphic and clear identity was designed with strong, engaging typography in support. The theme of the event, conflict and compromise (about which students would have to create presentations), was illustrated in a more unusual manner than educators might be used to. The importance and scale of the event was underscored throughout each piece in the confidence and tone with which it was presented.

The postcard and invitation were printed using two spot colours (keeping costs down for this small museum) on uncoated stock. Unusually, the two spots were mixed and overlaid to create gradients and tints, a process that needs careful pre-press work and a high attention to detail as there is no way to know if it is set up correctly until it goes on press. Thankfully it came out very well, and the piece proved very successful with the highest participation and attendance rate for History Day ever.