We thought a few introductions to the team who tinkers with your brand translations was in order. After all, we’ve been playing them up as guides and experts of brand expression, but often they get reduced down to job title when we boast about our unique experiential design makeup. For one blog only, we’re putting a temporary spotlight their skills and storied pasts because it’s about time we bragged about these creative minds.
Loren Zemlicka | Principal
First up, the guy who started the foray into experiential design at Thysse. A creative in one way or another for most of his life, Loren brought his 20 years of graphic design experience and creative direction to Thysse in 2013 and only looked back to bring a few friends along for the ride (more on them in a moment). A renowned Play-Doh sculptor in his early years, he’s since moved on to molding enterprise brands into hierarchical masterpieces and has been known to moonlight a blog or two. Never content to master one skill, his efforts now stretch to encompass print design, web design, video production, copywriting, photography and of course, experiential (environmental) graphic design.
Geoff Sabin | Principal
Geoff Sabin’s a little shaggier these days than his picture would suggest, but he’s still got the same focus and drive on every project as he did on day one. Geoff joined our team shortly after its inception, and our house band has been thanking him ever since. Our principal architect by day, and on Rhythm Guitar and Lead Vocals by night/is-it-actually-really-early-the-next-morning, Geoff brings over 20 years of design and architecture experience to the Thysse crew. He can design a building, move on to design everything inside and outside the building, and then finish with a design of the invitations for the grand opening Geoff infuses creative energy into everything he does, and has a very specific taste in pens, check out the now-discontinued Yasutomo stylist pens, we’re still warring with the guy on eBay with the last box.
Kris Marconnet | Senior Designer
Kris excels at visual branding elements in corporate, education and healthcare settings. A practicing lawn artist, she’s mastered the intricate turns and specific step counts to create an exact match to the revered Scottish “Royal Stewart” tartan in her own backyard. This latest design received modest praise from the neighbors, though they’re still a little leery after the more controversial piece, “Reclining Nude Eating Grapes.” We wish Mrs. Jensen well in her recovery… What were we doing? Ah yes, bragging about our master illustrator and logo developer. Probably swearing like a sailor internally that she’s the first designer on the list of praise, we’ll have to bribe her with cans of Bubly to make up for it. Like a silent assassin, her 25 years of accomplished design work often speaks for itself.
Julie Kimmell | Project Manager
We want your project to be beautiful, but we also want to be sure it stays on schedule and budget too. Hailing from the beautiful shores of an Illinois farm and a life spent raising hot dogs and bears, Julie is our professional creative management maven. We’re thrilled she left a string of Amazonian corporations, the three-martini lunches, fashion model shoots and glamourous haute-couture lifestyle behind to join our team; who doesn’t long for a hard hat now and then? With over 20 years of experience in creative and schedule wrangling, Julie supports the team with financials, project plannign, estimating and documentation on every design project and thankfully runs that weekly status meeting with military precision.
Allyson Casey | Concept Designer
We probably shouldn’t brag about theft on here, but you could say we stole Allyson away after collaborating on a multi-year project. Maybe stole is a bit harsh, we are pretty irresistible after all. She joined the Thysse Design crew in 2018 and brought her wealth of knowledge as a designer, art director, and artist along with. She’s also got a penchant for obscure indie folk music. If it’s got guitars, mandolins, or fiddles, you can bet it’s on her Spotify playlist. Typically armed with a cup of coffee and at least one Airpod in, she can nail a brand’s essence in record time, and translate it to walls, windows, and more. We usually pause the stopwatch for that second part.
Evan Hildebrand | Architectural Designer
Mr. Texas Panini himself, Evan comes to us from…Ohio. We’re kidding of course. This renowned humorist and ultimate frisbee cutter graduated Summa Cum Laude, with Distinction from University of Minnesota. Writing that out seems prestigious and oddly NSFW all at once… degrees and an eight-semester Dean’s list streak in hand, he then secured a sweet gig as a Design Associate in – you guessed it – Dallas, Texas. After perfecting his pronunciation of “y’all,” and confirming his cowboy boot size, Evan hopped back to the Midwest and joined Thysse Design to specialize in 3D design, modeling, and rendering
Jen Braga | Marketing Director
We don’t make it a pattern, but sometimes we like the people we work with enough to hire them on our team. She’s been a project manager, designer, brand manager, and marketing specialist, so we thought it’d be best to combine it all in one role our our team. Jen is a University of Wisconsin MBA graduate specializing in marketing and branding. She understands the importance of powerful brand messaging and may use the term “unaided brand awareness” approximately 23.5x more often than the average person.
Angie Biermeier | Designer
We round out introductions with our very first Thysse Design hire. Angie came from the print design, copy layout and logo development world, and has since broadened her skillset, working in the built environment to create facility branding programs. Think that’s impressive? Wait till you see her Donnie and Marie memorabilia collection. With over 20 years of design experience, we’ll listen to her talk about the Osmond lunch boxes, coloring books, framed (and signed) 8x10s all day because when it comes down to it, Angie is a technical production artist wiz. Truly, her art file setups are a thing of art.
So there you have it, the team who draws the connection between material and messaging, and brings your brand into a new plane. In addition to these key personnel, we also have a staff comprised of a skilled craftsmen and women who love what they do. It is a team woven together with collective expertise and bound by satisfaction of a job well done.
https://www.thysse.com/blog/experiential-design-dream-team-defined/