It’s April, and the final season of Mad Men is upon us.

Matthew Weiner, creator of the popular AMC TV drama series, loves to infuse historical details into his show. So, it’s no surprise that he hired the legendary New York designer Milton Glaser to create the promotional ads for the seventh and final season.

Glaser is best known for his iconic I ♥ NY logo. According to fastcodesign.com, “he also actually worked in advertising in the late 1960s–the same period that the show’s antihero Don Draper and Roger Sterling are grappling to come to terms with.”

The article goes on to say, “Glaser illustrates that theme–Don’s ongoing wrestle with 1960s counterculture–with a swirling, technicolor burst of flowers, booze, and a woman’s portrait set against Don Draper’s silhouette. According to The New York Times, Weiner and his team at Mad Men co-opted that aesthetic from Glaser’s classic 1966 Bob Dylan poster.”

Co.Design asked Glaser how he arrived at the design of the poster. “This was all pre-ordained,” he said. “We knew we were deliberately replicating something that had already been done, a spirit of another moment in time: the spirit of the ’60s. Originally I think the client wanted an abstraction, which was to say non-identifiable things. They didn’t want a narrative to it, but when I started, the general narrative came to me–a narrative to many things in life, I suppose–of a woman, drinking, wine, and if you look there’s a floating shoe coming off the right hand side. The narrative is simple-minded for the time, but the producer said they in fact reflect what’s coming up in the show.”

To read the full article, visit the Co.Design site: Graphic Design God Milton Glaser On Creating An Ad For Mad Men

Just for fun, watch how the Mad Men production team recreated the 1960s look and feel for the show: