New Chief Design Officer To Align Bx, Ex and Cx
Branding veteran Justin Peters brings two decades of global experience to Liquid Agency
Liquid Agency is proud to announce the addition of veteran creative director Justin Peters as their chief design officer. In his new role, Peters will play an integral part in aligning the agency’s brand experience, employee experience and customer experience work through the prism of inspired design thinking and execution.
Peters has worked across categories and cultures around the world for over two decades, including while serving as executive creative director at two of New York’s renowned branding and design firms: Siegel+Gale and Carbone Smolan Agency.
For Peters, joining Liquid Agency represents a chance to engage with clients and help them better navigate branding challenges through design.
“Over the years, I’ve had the privilege to work with a diverse number of clients, ranging literally from presidents to kings, media stars to starchitects, and tech moguls to the Muppets,” Peters said. “That experience has given me a deep well of skills to draw on when confronting the unique branding issues that face companies of all shapes and sizes. There’s an incredible opportunity here at Liquid Agency to dig deeper with both current and new clients to uncover the creative opportunities that will help us deliver to them even more value.”
While with Siegel+Gale, Peters led engagements for a range of international clients including Google, Motorola, Hewlett Packard, Intelsat, SAP, GE, Blue Origin and the Center for World Culture in Saudi Arabia. Notable clients while working with Carbone Smolan include Boston Consulting Group, Tapestry, Dale Carnegie, The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Sesame Workshop and The White House Millennium Council.
Global clients bring next-level challenges
One of the more interesting design challenges Justin has faced centered on the brand development and launch of Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). The challenge was to create a holistic branding program that would position KAUST as a unique community of leading scientists and engineers, independent in spirit, but united in their desire to build an unprecedented institution that advances both science and society.
The project proved to be the most comprehensive Peters ever worked on, requiring deep cultural immersion; brand positioning that would engage an international audience of top researchers, staff and students; a verbal and visual identity system that would perform in multiple languages across platforms and touchpoints while resonating with local, regional and global communities; and a dual-language naming system that would include all the streets, facilities and features of an entirely new city on the shores of the Red Sea.
“True collaboration between all the disciplines and stakeholders throughout the process was essential to meet the client’s high expectations and the incredibly tight deadlines,” Justin said.
Rebuilding design culture
Ask Liquid Agency CEO Scott Gardner what the company needed at the end of 2020, and he frankly notes: “We needed to look for an established creative leader to foster and build a stronger design culture at the agency. After an exhaustive and thorough search, we were delighted to align with Justin and have him join our executive team. He brings so many tangibles to the company and a number of unique intangibles that are an added bonus.”
Dennis Hahn, Liquid Agency’s chief strategy officer points out that branding has changed substantially over the past 20 years since Liquid Agency’s founding, which is why he is so excited by what Justin brings to the company. “Brands are now experiential, spanning a broad range of touchpoints for both customers and employees. This demands that our design leadership be able to orchestrate a highly diverse creative team over multiple geographies to deliver powerful creative solutions for our clients that express our strategic intent. Justin has proven he can fit that bill.”
Peters, who holds a bachelor of fine arts degree from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia as well as certificates from the Rhode Island School of Design and Parsons School of Design, shares his design philosophy: “By encouraging curiosity in ourselves and our clients, and injecting more creativity into our process, together we can get to more unexpected solutions—brand-building tools, systems and support that move both people and the needle. I believe this is a real and unique opportunity for us and our clients. It’s about bringing brilliant strategy to life in ways that connect with emotions, drive choice and have measurable business impact.”
Justin will help us bring the proverbial “show” to our “tell”—delivering to clients a new level of design substance, craft and action. We’re excited to welcome him aboard.
