Graduates of the Summer Course of 2012
Jack Curry
Jack Curry is a graduate of the BFA Graphic Design program at Cal State University, Long Beach, and is also a graduate of Type@Cooper. With a background in branding and typeface design, Jack is interested in the seemingly unseen systems that we create and surround ourselves with, constantly ruminating on the aggregate impact of common items that comprise so much of our daily lives.
Jan Dornig
Jan Dornig grew up in Austria, and was educated at the University of Applied Sciences Salzburg, where he studied Design and Product Management. He has interned for Duller Engineering, Mattro, Design Research Salzburg and Design Affaires.
Jason Flakes
Jason Flakes hails from Columbus and Akron, Ohio, and studied Industrial Design at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. He believes that design is a responsibility, informed by all the senses no matter the medium. He currently resides in Northern Virginia, where he consults in the fields of Industrial Design and Graphic design, also running his own architectural photography firm.
Lauren Hamilton
Lauren Hamilton is a graduate of Penn State University and the Art Institute, where she studied communications, English, and Interior Design. Her creative practice includes writing, design, and music production.
Esra Karadeniz
Esra Karadeniz is a graduate of Pratt Institute’s Industrial Design department, where she focused on furniture and jewelry design. She currently maintains a studio in Istanbul where she paints and produces jewelry.
Seth Kranzler
Seth Kranzler is a product design engineer at OXO, with a background in mechanical engineering and mechanics. Having worked as a CNC machinist and metal fabricator since high school, he crafted a home-brewed go-kart and turbocharged race car in his parent’s garage. After acting as lead aerodynamicist and team manager for Drexel’s Formula SAE race team, Seth went on to be a process manager and product designer at NextFab Studio.
Scott Lundberg
Designer and educator Scott Lundberg teaches Industrial Design at Pratt Institute, and Exhibit Design at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Recently he became an IDSA Section Vice Chair for Communicative Environments. Scott designed the Gossner College Campanile in Bihar Ranchi, India, a shower shelf based on DARPA technology for Shelfworks, and a display driven wine finding experience for Bottlerocket Wine & Spirit. Scott lives in the Red Hook, a neighborhood of Brooklyn.
Miguel Olivares
Miguel Olivares graduated from California Polytechnic State University, Pomona, with an emphasis in Sculpture and Drawing. Over the past years he has focused on producing custom furniture, messenger bags, and drawings. His multicultural upbringing has strengthened his passion for design and art, and the power they have to change society and culture.
Miguel has worked in the food retail business for over a decade, which now informs his ventures into the new field of Food Design. Miguel is currently part of the Class of 2015 in the MFA Products of Design program at the School of Visual Arts.
Paolo Salvagione
Paolo Salvagione is an artist who works at the intersection of engineering, participation, and levity. He has worked with Boeing and NASA, and is the design engineer on the Clock of the Long Now. His recent residency at the Headlands Center for the Arts sent people out a second story window. And then back in.
Davut Sidi-Safarti
Originally from Turkey, Deyvi relocated to New York City to study industrial design at Pratt Institute. He now specializes in furniture and product design.
Jennifer Stevenson
Jennifer Stevenson is a founding partner of LivIn design Inc., parent company to Storio digital and SKN design. She designs everything from web- and print-related materials to identities and products. Her clients range from small to midsized companies across a multitude of industries. In 2007 Jennifer designed a set of reusable totes that were featured in national publications such as Real Simple, Town & Country, and Health Magazines.
Keshna Thermitus
Keshna Thermitus attributes her deep appreciation of learning, maintaining and preservation of culture to her experience of being raidsed in a Haitian household. She believes that culture must last for generations and be flexible as it adapts to changing ideas. In turn, she aims to employ these same principles in her design career, as she constantly learns, educates, and reimagines her design perspective.
Marente van der Valk
As an Industrial Designer and enthusiastic Maker, Marente is interested in the influence the profession has on consumer culture and environmental health. Her main focus has been the reuse, repair and redesign of objects and materials that are usually discarded or simply overlooked. More recently, she has been exploring the reasons why and moments in which emotional connections are made with certain items. Intrigued by this bond between person and object and its associated memories, she has been mending broken memorabilia and exploring these relationships as part of her work in the Design and Environment MA at Goldsmiths University of London.
Joseph Weissgold
Joseph always had wanted to be an inventor and so found himself studying Industrial Design right out of highschool at Carleton University. As he studied, he became increasingly frustrated with many aspects of the current industry of mass production. Upon moving to New York, Joseph took two years away from product design to study consumerism, mysticism, urbanism, socialism, sustainability, and a multitude of other subjects. Because of his extensive experience working in informal education, Joseph is particularly interested in the reform of the education system. He hopes one day to call himself both a system designer and a game designer. He is currently part of the inaugural Class of 2014 in the MFA Products of Design program at the School of Visual Arts.