reactions

Strong branding helps carve out a distinctive voice in today’s noisy landscape that is filled with emails, social media, and traditional marketing. No longer limited to companies creating products — good branding is needed by individuals providing services, too —a point understood by today’s savvy creative professional who knows that doing great work is no longer enough to get them noticed.

For over 14 years, MSLK has worked with countless talented creatives: artists, photographers and forward-thinking artist representatives. We’ve  helped them focus their messaging promoting their services to create distinctive, memorable identities, which connect directly their audience. Making sure that these brands look great across varied media has been carefully considered, too — and it’s the reason we are trusted to oversee all aspects of a brand.

We’re now showcasing some of our best examples of the work we’ve done for creative services into in a short, entertaining video reel. Enjoy, and get inspired!

Last week we were delighted once again to be a part of the Annual Teen Design Fair produced by the Cooper Hewitt, National Design Museum, featuring keynote speaker Tim Gunn. Every year teens from all around NYC are invited to learn about careers from over thirty professionals working in the fields of fashion, industrial, multi-media and graphic design as well as architecture. This was our fifth year taking part of this amazing event, allowing us to meet the future stars of our profession, while we offer advice we’ve learned over the course of our profession.

Read More

This month marks the beginning of MSLK’s 14th year of doing business. When I think about all the things that have happened during that time, I’m astounded. We’ve watched the rise of the internet and the burst of the .com bubble — and NYC rebuild itself from the darkest days of 9/11.  We’ve witnessed Apple simultaneously demonstrate the power design can bring to a brand while also making the tools used to create design accessible to anyone. We transitioned from Quark to InDesign. The humble telephone has morphed into an invaluable tool giving us real-time updates of everything imaginable, ensuring work never stops. We reveled in the transformation Flash brought to online experiences, and continue to transition as Steve Jobs’s personal vendetta brings Flash to its knees. Depending on who you ask, we’ve weathered at-least two recessions and watched the boom of design on a global scale.
Read More

MSLK Creative Director and Co-Founder Marc S Levitt was quoted in a recent Atlantic article, speaking about the design profession’s critical — yet largely unsung — role. The article aims to draw parallels between wide-ranging professions from fact-checkers to anesthesiologists, describing them the “Invisibles.”

Citing examples ranging from book design to the now-infamous Palm Beach County “butterfly ballot” in the 2000 presidential election, Levitt describes the careful role designers play in shaping others’ content:

While some may think that the best design always grabs our attention, Levitt counters that great design often shouldn’t call attention to itself. “I’m not as concerned with prettying things up as I am with the end user being engaged in the right way.”

The article seeks to draw a connection between various professions, finding common traits:

Meticulousness, savoring great responsibility, and seeking only internal satisfaction are a trifecta of traits—a near antithesis of our societal ethos of insouciant attention-cravers—as a culture we’d all do well to follow.

Full article, by David Zweig, can be read here: http://mslk.co/zFPIm2

NYC is thriving despite this crazy heat. MSLK has rounded up another fab list of things to do this summer.
Read More

Join Sheri L Koetting, co-founder and Chief Strategist at MSLK, at the Fashion News Workshop as she discusses current content strategies in her lecture What to Post Where & Why: Content Strategies for Social Media. Learn how to get the most out of your social media outlets by investigating how to:

• Find the right Social Media platforms for your brand
• Make all content online more engaging and interactive
• Leverage the new relationships consumers are forming online to encourage word-of-mouth referrals
• Respond to new consumer behaviors with targeted promotions
• Track and analyze the overall brand sentiment consumers are conveying
Read More

MSLK’s “Take Less” installation is featured in IUEOA Magazine’s 4th issue, Do Not Dump, as a selection by Petz Sholtus for his piece “Eco Design Products.”

Read More

MSLK’s Sheri L Koetting was mentioned in Happi‘s coverage of the HBA session, “Social Media: Marketing for the 21st Century.” The article highlights MSLKs experience in reinvigorating fashion and beauty brands and helping them embrace social media platforms.

“Social Media: Marketing for the 21st Century”
Happi, Magazine
2010

This past weekend, a couple of us at MSLK had the opportunity to take a break from our computer screens and have some fun with words. The Spark Typography Workshop invited participants to use unconventional materials to illustrate ordinary words, and the results were rather “hair raising.”

Read More

The holidays are upon us, and we’re getting in the spirit by giving away 10 sets of MSLK “Cheers!” gift tags! Each set contains 26 adhesive gift tags that are perfect for the holidays as well as any other time of year. To enter simply “like” us on Facebook and then enter under the Sweepstakes tab. This offer is only available until December 3rd so enter for a chance to win now!