Dr. Katherine Gillieson

Katherine is a designer, researcher, and educator with over 20 years in higher education; she is an Associate Professor in Communication Design at Emily Carr. Her interests include information design, editorial design, and the theory and philosophy of design, with a focus on design and communication as empowering tools for socially engaged projects. Recent projects include the Community Networks Roadmap and experiments in micro-publication. She is a founding member of Graphic Research, the Occasional Press, and The Stationery Project at ECU.

Morgan Martino

Morgan is an interdisciplinary designer, researcher, and educator. Her current research practice explores the ways in which everyday objects, interactions, and collections can be understood as sites for engaging with complex systems of gender, consumer culture, shared spaces, and climate change through community- and place-based engagements. She is currently completing her Master of Design at Emily Carr, where she was valedictorian for her graduating year and received her Bachelor of Design in 2021. She has worked across many research labs, including the Health Design Lab, Circular Food Innovation Lab, DESIS Lab, and Graphic Research Lab. She is the founder and leader of the Roving Designers Collective and co-organizes a pluriversal reading group with the Design Research Society. Morgan has been a member of The Stationery Project since 2019, and in 2024 taught “The Stationery Project: Creative Lab”. 

Emilie Jingyi Liu

Emilie (she/they) is a multidisciplinary designer and researcher with a background in Communication Design and Interaction Design. She is currently pursuing her master’s degree at Emily Carr University, focusing on research in social design, community building and engagement, and participatory research. Her current research aims to empower female family caregivers by reducing their burdens and offering additional support. Emilie was a Research Assistant at the Shumka Centre, where she collaborated with startup companies as a UX Designer, and is working as a brand designer for several non-profit art and women empowerment organizations, actively engaging with her communities and contributing her design skills. She is excited to join the Graphic Research Unit web redesign project in Fall 2024.

Bahar Mousavi Firouzabadi

Bahar is a Master of Interaction Design student and a Research Assistant with The Stationery Project. She completed her undergraduate degree in Graphic Design in Montreal and has a strong passion for UX/UI and visual design. She loves anything that brings design and science together, and she’s always happy with a cup of tea or coffee in hand.

Abi Simatupang

Abi (they/she) is a communication designer + illustrator, writer, and researcher from Jakarta, Indonesia, and is currently based in Vancouver, BC. Their interests range wide, from print design to bookmaking, social justice + intersectionality to multilingual writing, and so much more.

Brendan Denesiuk

Brendan is a visual artist and graphic designer whose passion centres itself around typography and bookmaking, with a body of work focused on the intersections between creative writing and expressive typography. A deeper look into their various projects can be seen on their website.

Jon Hannan

Jon holds an MA and a BA (Hons) in Design & Art Direction from Manchester School of Art and a CertEd from Huddersfield University. He joined Emily Carr in 2016, having previously held the positions of Senior Lecturer of Graphic Design at Manchester School of Art and Lecturer/Senior Lecturer of Fashion Communication and Promotion at Nottingham Trent University. Focusing on community-centred co-design, Jon’s research has been featured in international design publications, journals, and online platforms such as the Design Research Society, the Design for Health Journal, IdN, Computer Arts, the Guardian and CNN. Alongside teaching, Jon founded and ran Manchester-based design studio, OWT, for six years. OWT started as an experimental and collaborative publication before growing into a fully practicing design studio. In 2019 he won the Design Incubation Educators Award in the category of Teaching and in 2020 he was the recipient of the Ian Wallace award for Teaching Excellence at Emily Carr University.”

Kyla Zwack

Kyla is a recent graduate from Emily Carr University of Art + Design with a bachelor’s in communication design. Her work involves community-based participatory design research, print and digital production, and typographic layouts. Kyla is an emerging interdisciplinary graphic designer with a passion for using design to tell real stories in a unique and compelling way.

Aamir Rangwalla

Diego H. Dorantes

Diego is an interdisciplinary designer specializing in brand identity, editorial design, typography, photography, and web design. His background in architecture combined with his specialization in areas like photography, publishing and visual identity allowed him to explore and contribute to different kind of projects. He’s fonder of the collaborative Diego is an interdisciplinary designer specializing in brand identity, editorial design, typography, photography, and web design. His background in architecture combined with his specialization in areas like photography, publishing and visual identity allowed him to explore and contribute to different kind of projects. He’s fonder of the collaborative platform Studio Muga, where he currently works as a freelancer. Diego’s design research has explored topics related to contemporary publishing practices.

Howsem Huang

Howsem Huang is a Toronto-based graphic designer and multidisciplinary artist. He holds a Master of Design degree from Emily Carr University in Vancouver and BFA degrees in graphic design and photography from the California College of the Arts in San Francisco. His primary practices include publication design, publishing, and Risography. He previously worked as a design fellow at Chronicle Books, where he has designed books such as Young Queer America, Living While Black, and LEGO In Focus. As a self-publishing artist, he explores his Cantonese-Chinese identity and experiences as a Chinese émigré through artist’s books and zines. His works have been showcased in the Boston University Art Galleries, IS A GALLERY, and SF Camerawork.

Isla Pedrana 

Isla is a designer interested in reframing how we document our cities and landscapes in order to develop a new thread of design journalism more influenced by these places. After graduation from the Glasgow School of Art, Isla spent years in industry, working in communications within Business Development teams. Isla brings a strategic viewpoint to projects, working across creative direction, project management and copy writing.

Jaz Halloran

Jaz Halloran (BDes 2007) is a Vancouver-based graphic designer who creates identities, websites, artists’ books, magazines, zines, and print ephemera. His projects explore image-making, identity, and communication within visual culture.

Julia Pepler

Julia is a graphic designer whose passion is sustainable, globally conscious design. In tandem with design, she is skilled in bookbinding and printmaking techniques such as relief and silkscreen. More about her work is available on her website.

Kelly Small

Kelly is an award-winning creative director and communication designer with proven experience across design, marketing and advertising. Bridging commercial design and academia, their research and practice centres on the development and dissemination of accessible guidance toward enhanced ethical and inclusive practice. As a creative leader, idea generator, writer, and strategist, Kelly’s aim is to support teams to work within problematic systems in order to incrementally transform the industry and realize meaningful change.

Kelly’s new book The Conscious Creative: Practical Ethics for Purposeful Work is available at local, independent book stores as well as Indigo  Barnes & Noble  and Amazon.

Leea Contractor

Leea is curious about Design’s role in amplifying endangered cultures. As such, the themes of culture, identity and storytelling drive her practice. She continues to explore these themes as an MDes candidate at Emily Carr University of Art + Design. Prior to this, she graduated from the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture in 2017, with a distinction in Communications Design. She was awarded the prestigious Founders Award along with The Agha Hassan Abidi award for demonstrating a high level of compassion, humility and generosity towards her fellow human beings. She was formerly the Associate Creative Manager for the Dawn Media Group in Pakistan, where she was responsible for the design of Dawn’s weekly and bi-monthly publications, as well as special reports for the Group’s daily flagship newspaper. Leea is also a Fellow of the Cross Culture Program by the Institut FÜr Auslandsbeziehungen, where she worked at Mosaik die Abrafaxe, Germany’s oldest and most widely circulated comic book company, in Berlin for 3 months. More information about her work can be found on her website.

Ruby Pang

Ruby is a communication designer with a passion for creating work that allows her audiences to connect. Her main body of work lies in print media, exploring topics such as identity and behavioural change. More information about her work can be found on her website.