Zago, LLC

Design for Social Change is a group of professionals who are harnessing the power of design to address systemic inequalities in our society and the resulting limitations to human development. Connecting visionaries, implementers, academics and other passionate people who believe we can design a better world for all.

Set up by Zago in the fall of 2008, we're over 2300 members strong and growing everyday. Join the discussion here.

Gianluca brings to Zago his extensive experience in finance and business development for SME’s entering the U.S. market, focusing on marketing strategy, business planning, joint venture building, corporate finance and institutional relations. He has been involved in a number of private ventures, including RGE (Roubini Global Economics) and brings in substantial experience in economics and marketing. His involvement in political fundraising and political campaigning with several political leaders in the US and Italy has allowed him to grasp the importance of communication and perception building. Prior to starting his own practice, he was the Director of Business Development at Muzinich & Co., Inc., a $13 billion corporate credit manager. Gianluca is an economist by training and his experience ranges from economic consulting (at the start of his career in the EU and the private sector), to bottom up company analysis, portfolio management, corporate strategy and business development.

Gianluca has lived in Italy, Belgium and the United States. He is a Fulbright Scholar and holds an MA in International Economics from Yale, where he also worked with the Institution for Social and Policy Studies. He obtaind his BA in Business Law and Economics from Bocconi University in Milan. He has collaborated with top policymakers in Italy (including two former minister and a former Prime Minister) and with some Italian national media like Il Sole 24 ore, l’Unita’, Rai.

Gianluca is fluent in Italian, French, English

For one month, Zago transformed the lobby of the UN General Assembly with twelve beanbags representing CO_² emissions per capita for selected countries.

See the making of here.

We're proud to announce that our Nine Planets Wanted! project was included in: I.D. Magazine's Annual Design Review, AIGA 365, and Type Director's Club 55.

We would like to thank our partners in crime at the UNDP office who made this project possible.

If you would like to hear the story behind the project, watch Manuel's recent presentation at Mindlab in Copenhagen.

Visual identity, collateral and website for Conference on Designing for User Experience, San Francisco Nov 3-5 2005. Organized by the AIGA, SIGCHI and SIGGRAPH.

Natural spring water may be good for your health, but bottles themselves threaten our environment by swallowing landfill space and increasing air pollution from incineration. With CarpetsInter we launched a new product line: EcoSoft® the next generation of recycled carpet baking.

Soft on the environment, Soft to the step and 100% recyclable.

HMV, Yahoo, MTV Networks, Samsung, Music Gremlin, Virgin, Imesh are some of the distribution partners that rely on the services, infrastructure and licensing capabilities of MediaNet. Through Medianet’s customized media download and subscription services, top global companies seamlessly distribute content through their own brands. So when the company contacted us to redesign their identity we were challenged with creating a brand that would be memorable while at the same time communicates trust, reliability and technological savviness.

Zago worked with one of the oldest and most extablished dating sites in Europe. The team at ilove needed new life to be injected into their brand, new energy into their campaigns, and new sense of belonging for their community. We acomplished all that with a new brand positioning and a new adversiting campaign.

We were asked to create a piece for Transition to a Green Growth Economy, the panel discussion organized by the Danish Ministry of Economic and Business Affairs during COP-15. The resulting animation is a time-based evolution of carbon-dioxide emissions as a result of growth. The 60 minute piece was projected onstage during the talk and distributed to the audience as a take-away flipbook at the event. Even though the outcomes of the conference did not meet the world's expectations and its needs, we at Zago are eager to continue our involvement with this issue.

Human development is about putting people at the center of development. It is about individuals realizing their potential, increasing their choices and enjoying the freedom to lead lives they value. Since 1990, the United Nations Development Programme's annual Human Development Reports have explored challenges including poverty, gender, democracy, human rights, cultural liberty, globalization, water scarcity and climate change.

Migration, both within and beyond borders, has become an increasingly prominent theme in domestic and international debates, and is the topic of the 2009 Human Development Report. We were honored to lead the design of this year's report. Our challenge was to create an engaging experience while keeping the document's academic and policy nature intact. We created a design that supports the topic of migration and human mobility, simplified the nature of the information design and reworked the report's overall template to prepare it for the next 10 years of use.
The report will be available October 5th, 2009

Before joining Zago, Muriel worked as an art director and designer in the studio she founded in Geneva and served numerous clients in Switzerland. In 2005, she moved to NYC to work with Stefan Sagmeister and various agencies. Innovative conceptual thinking combined with an uncompromising visual sense guides her practice. Muriel has created several award-winning visuals for campaigns in the cultural field (Fête de la Musique 2005-2007, Fureur de Lire 2001-2003) and for humanitarian organizations (Children in War, ICRC, 2002). Her work is part of the permanent collection of the Museum für Gestaltung in Zurich and has been featured in the leading French and German magazines Etapes and Novum. She has won several national and international competitions and awards, including recently a European Design Merit Award for best annual report.

Muriel holds two M.A. degrees from the University of Geneva in communication & media studies and philosophy. She studied in Switzerland and Germany. She is a native French speaker, fluent in English and German.

After experiencing the realities of life in the red district of Calcutta, Ross Kauffman and Zana Briski produced and directed the Academy Award ® winning documentary "Born into Brothels". As a result of the documentary and the attention that it generated Kids with Cameras was formed. It is a non-profit organization that teaches the art of photography to marginalized children in communities around the world. Our involvement started early and included positioning, strategy, Identity and web design.

Art exhibitions can illustrate selected human rights topics from around the world. They build awareness and encourage dialogue. They can be organized to bring together experts and professionals addressing the subjects exhibited. With ICTE we worked on achieving these very goals.

ICTE facilitates conferences in the field of tolerance education and human rights.

In a service economy, the quality of work is inseparable from the quality of the worker. Beyond the competition among firms and products, there is novel competition among workers themselves, who actually have become a part of the marketed products. In a service economy, producing very often requires establishing a relationship, therefore stressing one’s singularity. Workers are less and less valued for what they have in common with other workers, and more and more for what in them is singular, different. They have more autonomy, but their real asset is no longer their common worth, rather it is what cannot be pooled, i.e. their singularity.

356 pages of architecture, interior design and contemporary art sandwiched in a die-cut cardboard cover!

Zago's latest intervention in the lobby of the United Nations displays key facts and figures about Education and the Millennium Development Goals. Seven giant books populate the space on a vibrant pink grid that connects the dots between investment in education and its impact on human development.

For example, did you know $16 billion a year in aid would send all kids to school in low-income countries? This is about half of the amount Europeans and Americans spend on ice-cream each year.

For more about the messages behind the exhibit, check out UNESCO's website here.

Rafael has previous experience working with both corporate and public institutions, specially in the art, music and fashion industries. He was involved in prominent branding projects, social media managing and exhibits.

Rafael holds both Product and Graphic Design degrees from Rio de Janeiro's ESDI, the most prestigious design school in Brazil. He also studied at HfG Schwäbisch Gmünd, Germany where he deepened his branding knowledge. He speaks fluently English and Portuguese and some German.

We worked with Adidas and RunnersWorld to create an online tool so that amateur and professional runners could choose the correct shoe to run in. “What difference does it make?” you may ask. Well, “There's no single 'best shoe' - everyone has different needs. All sorts of things - your biomechanics, your weight, the surfaces you run on, and obviously, the shape of your feet - mean that one person's ideal shoe can be terrible for another person” so there you go, choose wisely!

This project was executed in collaboration with our friends at Blank Mosseri.

The late architect Philip Johnson designed what he called a “habitable sculpture”, a 28-story residential tower with cubist angles. Johnson, at the age of 95, said of the project “It’s the best building I ever designed. It is my last opportunity in New York to do something good for the city and something good for art.” We were fortunate then to be working on making this project a reality. The campaign that launched the project "Be a Friend to Art" has been recognized by the MOMA and the Getty Museum. This project is ongoing and we hope to be able to announce the day when ground will be broken to honor Johnson's vision.

We have been given the task to transform an OEM manufacturer into a leading global brand.  Taking inspiration from machine and hand-woven processes, the lotus and flora of Thailand, we designed this symbol for CarpetsInter, the leading carpet manufacturer in Southeast Asia. The mark is a small part of an extensive corporate identity re-design and re-naming project that we are currently leading. Our goal has been to transform this OEM manufacturer into a leading global brand. 

Columbia University is one of the most renowned educational institutions in the United States. Nevertheless for its students the quality of basic services and the means by which they are administered shapes their opinion of the institution and marks their experience. With the Department of Student Services we worked closely at bridging the gap between students and administration, creating a dialogue that helped both groups become more aware of each others’ needs and expectations. Ultimately we created a channel that gave the necessary feedback for the relationship to evolve, for services to improve and for satisfaction to increase.

Happy to announce the Restrepo website is up and running.  Congrats to both Tim & Sebastian for the film's GRAND JURY PRIZE at Sundance.

In 2008, Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington spent over a year in Afghanistan's Korengal Valley filming the men of the 101st Airbourne Division, Second Platoon. The film that resulted from their collection of footage is a profoundly intimate record of deployment and combat  – war without Hollywood lighting, special effects or cleverly crafted lines. Restrepo brings us closer to the reality of war in Afghanistan, and closer to those fighting that war – regardless of our own political beliefs.

Now more than ever, it's time to pursue our true passions.  Majora Carter is just one example of an everyday person engaging her community, and herself, for the better.

And she's not the only one.

On a new public radio program called The Promised Land, Majora invites visionaries from around the world and around the corner to share innovative ideas that are transforming the way people live. As friends of Majora, we were honored to design the identity and website for The Promised Land.

Subscribe to the podcast via RSS / ITunes

Our new installation opened at The Ecology Center in San Juan Capistrano, CA. With a water footprint of 1800 gallons a day and per person this is more than 850 gallons we need to siphon out of our daily life. See here how to Defeat the Juggernaut and stay tuned!

Human Rights Watch is one of the world's leading independent organizations dedicated to defending and protecting human rights. Their objective coverage of rights violations around the world gives voice to the oppressed and holds oppressors accountable for their crimes. The organization approached Zago with the goal of redefining its content delivery strategy.
By shifting the distribution of information from published reports to compelling multimedia content and news feeds, the new website is a powerful media channel that can flexibly deliver content while increasing Human Rights Watch's outreach and advocacy initiatives. New mobile and iPad applications further increase their reach, making their reports and information readily accessible.   

Nereo was born in 1967 in Basel, Switzerland.  He studied design at the Basel School of Design.  After working for 5 years in his own design studio, Nereo moved to New York and founded the design firm ZAGO.  In 2006, he opened a second office in Rio de Janeiro.

A team of multidisciplinary designers (graphic, interactive, industrial), with projects as diverse as their talents, Tellart's work blends physical computing with design-driven innovation to empower everyday life. 

From designing fast-prototyping tools for Nokia to creating medical simulations of obsessive compulsive disorder, Tellart has big ideas and the ability to find quick, tangible ways to implement them - even if it means hacking the occasional pedometer or Wii remote. 

As part of our continued brand strategy and positioning engagement, Zago created a new logo and tagline to place Tellart at the intersection between physical and digital design.

Tai Ping is a custom carpet and rug company that serves the luxury market with custom solutions for prestigious interiors - from hotels and casinos to Park Avenue residences, private jets and yachts. Our challenge was to translate the attention to detail and quality that is infused in their products to their communication material. We enjoyed the opportunity to work with them on their annual report and website.

United Services’ mission is to bring a new level of professional commitment, integrity and trust to the execution of large infrastructure projects in the Middle East. We worked with these three core values as the starting point for the development of their corporate identity. Our challenge was to build a brand that could navigate the diverse cultural spaces that the company operates in while maintaining the integrity of its message.

Finally a trend worth following. Nereo and Renata decided to build a green roof on top of their apartment building in Rio. Yes, they went crazy with the structural reinforcements and general opposition to the idea. So why have a green roof?  Why not? It is nice to look at, it brings peace and well-being to those around it, it provides excellent isolation from the summer heat, it has great acoustic insulation, it reduces urban temperatures, it reduces the impact of CO2 and nitrogen emissions and neutralizes the effect of acid rain, it reduces the volume of rainwater and its impact on city sewage, and it puts urbanites in touch with nature.  Want more? If you would like to know more about how to actually build your own green roof contact Nereo.

We recently collaborated with our friends at Tellart to design a pong game for a party at Bulo. Some of us have now gotten addicted to the game. Stay tuned for a little league tournament coming soon to a design studio near you.

"Changing the world may or may not work, but wouldn't you rather design trying?"

to learn more about this new initiative visit the AIGA website

How do you establish a national platform for innovation in Public Education?

Zago worked with the Senior Leadership of the Stupski Foundation and the CCSSO to support the planning, development, and design of The Partnership for Next Generation Learning and the Innovation Lab Network—a multi-state initiative to establish a common framework and platform for innovation in Public Education.

This project was devlivered through the Helsinki Group, a strategy and design network that Zago is a member of.

As a preamble to New York City's first Urban Design week, the Institute for Urban Design and Pecha Kucha New York presented “Dimensions of Urban Design”.

For our next event please follow us on facebook

Zago worked with the product development team at Bitbop to design, brand, and develop a next generation mobile platform for broadcast media. Designed around just-in-time content delivery and social engagement, Bitbop is a mobile application platform that changes how, when, and where subscribers get their content, and creates new content opportunities for advertising, distribution, marketing, and sharing.

For the past decade, Manuel has helped his clients bridge business and design by combining a deep expertise in developing and implementing communication strategies with an unmatched ability to craft compelling visual storytelling. In 1998 he joined Zago and helped shape the design consultancy into a world-class corporate identity and visual communication practice. Under his leadership the studio broadened its scope of services, industry reach and its creative vision. Zago’s clients include Fortune 500 companies, international nonprofits, start-ups and global brands. The studio has received several prestigious awards, won international competitions and its work has been accepted into the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art and the Getty Museum. Manuel holds an MFA in photography and related media from the School of Visual Arts, where he also taught as a faculty member, and a BFA in photography from Corcoran School of Art in Washington, DC.

He serves in the communications advisory board at Human Rights Watch, is a board member of photo agency VII, and acts as National Director of Social Engagement for Design for Good at the AIGA. Manuel has lived in the Soviet Union, Italy, Spain, Switzerland and England, before relocating to the United States in 1988. He is fluent in Italian, Spanish and English, and can be contacted at manuel@zagollc.com

In July of 2009 Ban Ki-moon, Secretary General of the United Nations, announced plans to launch the Global Impact and Vulnerability System (GIVAS), in order to "mobilize our full strength for better real-time data on the impact of the economic crisis on the poorest nations." In June, almost a year later, GIVAS changed its name to Global Pulse. Through a combination of expert analysis, technology innovation and local capacity building, Global Pulse will provide policy makers with predictive analysis of emerging vulnerabilities of specific population groups adn tools to improve their resilience to future shocks. ZAGO worked collaboratively with the Global Pulse team to craft a new brand identity for the initiative that embodies the organization's vision of harnessing innovation to create a world without vulnerable populations. Watch on-going developments here.

Yes this is what is like to bike to work in NYC!

A shortcut to the chaos that is your lunch hour, Gomobo lets city-dwellers Skip the Line(R) and order food on the go. Your online or text message order is prepaid and ready for pickup when you arrive at the restaurant. The service is receiving rave reviews and saving tech-savvy take-out eaters' valuable time.
We were early adopters of Gomobo and happy to design their new logo and in-store signage system.

You can sign up for the service here

“Climate change is the greatest challenge facing humanity at the start of the 21st Century. Failure to meet that challenge raises the spectre of unprecedented reversals in human development.“

We could not agree more with this statement after having worked with the UN on the Human Development Report for 2007/08. Our work included mapping many of the most disturbing data and scenarios for the report and creating a series of advocacy posters. The project is still ongoing and we will be keeping you posted on the next effort.