Collins:

A cowboy hat in Portland. Portland, Maine.

A pair of Tecovas on the Paris Metro.

Beyoncé in her Rhinestone Rodeo.

Americana is back. But, maybe it never left.

Once, the Americana aesthetic meant something narrow—small-town diners, Route 66, a pickup truck against an empty Western sky. But something’s shifting. Old mythology is being remade, reclaimed, and rewritten by new voices. Including voices that had been left out of the story.

On Sunday, March 9th at SXSW, we’re joining with our good friends at Monotype to gather in Austin, Texas at Arlyn Studios. It’s where Willie Nelson, Ray Charles, and Miranda Lambert have all left their mark. 

We aim to explore this question:

Why Americana? Why now? And who gets to wear the boots?

Among our speakers: Norm Clasen, the photographer behind the original Marlboro Man campaign. His images didn’t just sell Marlboro. They built a vivid, global ethos and story about the character of a country. But what about that story still captures our collective imaginations today?

We’ll be joined by voices of creative leaders from Yellowstone (the television series) Tecovas, Audiosocket, and NASA, among others. Expect your notion of America to be challenged. Expect good food. Expect a room full of people who care about culture enough to help shape it. 

Seats are extremely limited. In all transparency, we expect that seats may be sold out by the time that you read this. RSVP at the link in bio to join the waitlist. We will notify you if open seats are available until the day of the event. 

And if you don’t believe Americana is changing? Look around.

Those boots are already walking.

Jim Henson said “yes" to life. Yes to aliveness of all kinds–love, magic, whimsy, mischief. So when The Museum of Moving Image in New York City and the Jim Henson family asked us to partner with them to create a permanent exhibition to immortalize this timeless work, it was an instant “yes."
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For over three years, our team collaborated on all aspects of the exhibition including the design of the gallery environment, the design system, storytelling for the layout of the show, interactive technologies and installations in the gallery, and external marketing and communications.
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With original artifacts ranging from puppets, film clips, projections, drawings, set models, costumes, robotics, and more–we organized the story of Henson’s career into six key chapters, in collaboration with the Senior Curator of Collections and Exhibitions, Barbara Miller. Our team designed faceted architecture and a spatial system referencing the geometries of the museum—hinting at the boundless energy of Henson’s team itself. Much like how Kermit the Frog tries to hold The Muppet Show together before things fly off the rails, our system marries chaos with control; constant motion with a ringmaster’s sense of showmanship.
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Click the link in the bio to see our case study (better yet, if you’re in NYC, bring your friends and family to The Museum of Moving Image and experience this boundless display of creativity.)

"As children, we all live in a world of imagination, of fantasy, and for some of us that world of make-believe continues into adulthood.” — Jim Henson