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Early life

Sylvia Harris was born in 1953 in Richmond Virginia. She was a designer and design strategist, and she mentored designers. She has worked with important places such as academic institutes, government, veterans, etc. She graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a bachelor's degree of fine arts in communication art and design in the year of 1975. That is where she met American Institute of Graphic Arts medalist Philip Meggs who is a graphic designer as well. Her father was a renowned woman's sports coach and her mother was an art teacher and artist.

Growing up in Richmond Virginia during the 1950's and 60's she experienced racism. She experienced desegregation when both white and black students could study together at the same school. Black people had to dress up to go shopping in white owned department stores. She remembered her mother shouting from her car at the Ku Klux Klan while they were displaying on the street.

Early career

She moved to Boston after college and Boston is where she found her passion. Harris landed a job at Washington Business Group on Health and worked with Chris Pullman who became more than just a boss, he became a friend and mentor. Pullman saw that she had a lot of potential and helped her in her career. Harris landed a Job at the Architects Collaborative where she got introduced to environmental graphics, which helped her accomplished her achievements later in life. Harris left Architects Collaborative because she felt that she did not know enough about design and with the advice of Pullman she went to Yale graduate school and earned a master's degree of fine arts in graphic design. In 1980 her and along with David Gipson and Juanita Dugdale had co-founded two twelve associates which is a design firm in New York City where she did amazing work for Citi bank.

In the year of 1994, she started Sylvia Harris LLC after she left the two twelve company. Before she knew it she ended up finding herself helping to solve problems for Civic agencies, universities, and hospitals. Harris was the mastermind behind the design of the United States Census Bureau. Her experience helped her encourage those who were underrepresented citizens to participate. In 2014 she was awarded the American Institute of Graphic Arts medal.

Works

Sylvia Harris was hired as an independent project leader to develop a design for communication with patients more effectively for New York Presbyterian and Columbia University medical center. This was due to a 2001 survey taken of New York Presbyterian/Columbia found out that majority of first-time patients get lost trying to get to their appointment. This is for reason’s like poor signs, lack of funding for feature for the building, etc. For Harris to plan the project she had to go through five steps. The first step was assessment which was getting to the cause of the problem, the second step was management which was making sure the building is under control. The third step was coming up with a strategy to fix the problems, the next step was the designs, and the last step was implementation which was making negotiations for the designs to be approved.

death

She died on a Sunday July 24th, 2011 at the age of 57. She collapsed on July 21st while at a meeting in Washington, she was rushed to George Washington University Hospital where the doctors put her on life support, she eventually passed away due to heart problems. She is survived by her daughter Thai, husband Gary Singer, and her sister Juliette Harris.

reaction

Sylvia Harris was remembered by companies she worked at or co-founded. Some of those companies were American Institute of Graphic Arts, The Architects newspaper, Metropolis magazine, HOW Magazine, Public Policy Lab, Imprint, Design Observer, etc. Those who knew Sylvia were invited to share their memories and share their thoughts about her.

Her friend Jessica Helfand had this to say after her death.

“I first met Sylvia in 1979, when I was still a teenager and she was a graduate student in graphic design at Yale. Even then she was a force: smart, poised, clear-headed and without a pretention in the world... but my experience of Sylvia was a personal one-tethered to professional practice in a way, but enriched and ennobled by who she was, not what she did. And because I was there in those critical hours after she fell, I want to share a more personal side of my friend Sylvia.”

“Sylvia had the skin color of a perfect cappuccino. She had enviable, long legs, and beautiful hands, and a big, hearty laugh that filled the room. She celebrated Easter and Passover with equal zeal, loved India and Italy with equal intensity, and was as mindful about her daughter’s need for a new pair of mittens as she was the future of the American philatelic program...”

Stephen Heller from print magazine made this statement about Sylvia.

“Sylvia was a true conscience of this profession. She was a warm and sincere and always anxious to help others- especially young designers. She engaged in projects that were designed to help transform our lives for the better. Honestly, I was a little intimidated by Sylvia, even though she never did anything to make that so. She was just so natural and unassuming in her advocacy-never preaching, never forcing views. I looked to her as a beacon. And like a little kid looking for approval, the last time I saw her, at one of the SVA MFA program public events, when she told me how good she thought the presentations were, I was elated- because it was Sylvia.”

Alina Wheeler statement:

"My friend Sylvia was strong, serene, and fiercely bright. She will always be a source of inspiration for me. I hope that we are all thinking about how we can honor her and celebrate her legacy."

On public policy lab which she founded posted a video titled 2010 world usability day New York City, Sylvia Harris part one.

In the video she talked about design, activism, and communication. She talked about her journey searching for design activism. In the 1960's she grew up with a family that were big on the civil rights movement and they thought her that she should speak up about things that need changing. The march on Washington happened right in front of her house and it was in the 70's that Harris learned that graphic design could have an impact on her community. Her first project was "Hike", her and her friends decided to do a walk-a-thon which was focused on hunger.

Sylvia Harris:2014 AIGA medalist video:

The two speakers talks about how she redesigned the census, most people would have moved on to another project but this was fun to Harris, she loved the idea with being an ambassador for design. One of the speakers met Harris at the MFA program in graphic design at Yale university. They were exposed to a lot of different types of designs which increased Harris curiosity. She developed public information design which also increased her career. Her clients were mainly cultural organizations and museums. Her passion for design was because she wanted to make the world a better place.