David Schwarz photographed by Charlie Wan

For David Schwarz, design is so much more than graphic design—it’s an experience. Schwarz, the founder of New York’s design firm, hush, feels strongly that design should be dynamic and utilize other elements like architecture, sound, code, and technology to create an experience like no other.

In an interview on designboom.com, Schwarz says:

“For me, and at hush in general, graphic design is challenged by everything not graphic design – the other disciplines of design, art, architecture, code, film. If you look at the work in those surrounding fields, they continually criss-cross the field of traditional graphic design and in many cases, simply blow it up. At this point in my career, I have a love-hate relationship with the traditions of graphic design. The principles are sound, but we simply work in so many dynamic practices, from the worlds of creative code to parametric architecture to motion, that these traditions are continually uprooted – and rightly so.”

Here is an example of how hush created a real user “experience” for Niketown.

Hush’s approach is innovative, and is likely why companies like Nike, ExxonMobile, Estee Lauder, Esquire, and IBM (to name a few) hire them.

How does Schwarz choose the right people to work in his company? He told designboom.com:

“Hush is a renaissance-minded company. We’ll always hire the savvy generalist over the rock star specialist. I personally believe people (and therefore companies) are more interesting with these kinds of minds at the helm. The ecosystem within brands and their competitive landscape is incredibly complex.  It’s rarely static and it can be highly opaque. If I was a brand leader, I would engage companies that consist of the most diverse and nimble thinkers out there, who can zig when most zag. So, that’s the kind of company we’ve built.”

To learn more about the hush and its founder, David Schwarz, read the full article: Interview with David Schwarz of hush

See Schwarz in action in the 2013 Seattle Interactive Conference:

Subscribe to Seattle Interactive’s YouTube channel to see the 2014 videos as they come available: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcBYumCVsCib3yedsbEXwaA