Edelman
My first agency chair — designing for big end-client brands, often from a feeling rather than a brief.
At Edelman Digital I did pitch and delivery work for recognizable end clients. Two engagements capture the range: a legally-mandated Hyundai recall information site where every fact had to be exactly right, and a high-end PayPal holiday gift-giving experience conjured from a warm-but-vague idea.
Agency work runs on a different fuel.
I’d come up through startups and dev-driven teams, where requirements arrive as specs and constraints. Agency pitch work is different: the brief is often a feeling the team is chasing and will recognize only once they see it rendered. Both Edelman engagements taught me to design toward that — one under the hardest possible constraint, one under almost none.
A legal mandate. The challenge wasn’t creativity — it was getting every fact exactly right.
A pitch with no brief. The challenge was making a vague idea concrete enough to react to.
Where the challenge wasn’t creativity — it was accuracy.
IA and wireframes for a legally-mandated recall information site, delivered through Edelman for Hyundai. When the content is compliance-bound, the craft moves from invention to precision: a clear path to the right facts, exactly right, for anxious owners who need an answer fast.
The full story — information architecture and wireframes under legal constraint:
Read more about Hyundai RecallThe recall site’s wireframe — the craft here is precision, not invention: a clear path to the right facts for an anxious owner who needs an answer fast.
A gift-giving experience, conjured from “I’ll know it when I see it.”
A pitch concept for a high-end holiday gift-giving destination where PayPal users could discover unusual gifts — which turned out to be experiences, not products — and pay with PayPal. My job was turning a warm-but-vague idea into wireframes polished enough to carry into the final pitch, learning to design when the requirements are vague on purpose.
The full story — designing without a brief, the “experiences not products” unlock, and the full wireframe set:
Read more about PayPal HolidayThe “experiences, not products” unlock, rendered — a wireframe polished enough to carry the vague idea into the final pitch.
I learned to design when the requirements are vague on purpose— and where I’m strongest.
Agency concepting taught me what to ask, how far to push for clarity, and when to stop asking and start drawing — because on an abstract concept, the wireframe is the question. It also taught me, honestly, that I do my best work inside real constraints.