The 20 graphic designers inspiring us the most in 2025

These visionary creatives are redefining visual communication with bold aesthetics, cultural storytelling and boundary-pushing innovation across all mediums.

The graphic design landscape in 2025 is one of both tremendous opportunity and significant challenge. As brands seek authentic connections with increasingly diverse audiences, the demand for designers who can navigate cultural nuance while maintaining commercial appeal has never been higher. Meanwhile, the rise of AI tools is forcing the industry to double down on what makes human creativity irreplaceable: conceptual thinking, cultural insight, and emotional resonance.

That’s where this carefully curated list comes in. To identify the graphic designers making the biggest impact right now, we turned to our global community of creatives, art directors and industry insiders. The result is a diverse collection of voices from around the world, each bringing their own unique perspective to the practice of visual communication.

These designers are proving that great graphic design isn’t just about making things look beautiful – it’s about creating visual languages that speak to our shared humanity while celebrating what makes us different. Whether they’re crafting brand identities for Fortune 500 companies or designing posters for grassroots movements, each of them demonstrates the power of graphic design to inform and inspire.

1. Temi Coker

Temiloluwa (Temi) Coker is a Nigerian-American visual artist and graphic designer whose vibrant, Afrocentric compositions have redefined what contemporary graphic design can look like. Based in Dallas, Texas, Temi is the co-founder of Coker Studio, a culturally diverse multidisciplinary creative house that’s become a powerhouse for brands seeking authentic cultural storytelling.

His work seamlessly blends photography, graphic design and 3D graphics to create imagery that celebrates African diaspora culture with unprecedented boldness and sophistication. An Adobe Creative Resident alumni, Temi’s approach to design centres around representation, using colour, pattern, dimension and texture to depict layers of his Nigerian heritage in ways that are deeply personal and universally appealing.

2. Natasha Jen

A six-time National Design Award nominee, Natasha Jen is a partner at Pentagram New York, where she’s built a reputation for boundary-pushing work that challenges conventional thinking about branding and editorial design.

Born in Taipei, Taiwan, and joining Pentagram in 2012, Natasha has become one of the most influential voices in contemporary graphic design. Her work spans major cultural institutions, luxury brands, and editorial clients, always with an approach that prioritises conceptual rigour over surface aesthetics.

Natasha is also known for her provocative critiques of design thinking methodology, arguing for a more intuitive, less process-driven approach to creative problem-solving that has sparked important conversations across the industry.

3. Hugh Miller

Hugh Miller is a independent creative director based in London. In 2015, he co-founded the London office of the international design studio BOND. With an inquisitive approach and a passion for typography, Hugh is a visiting lecturer at The University of Greenwich and a board member of the International Society of Typographic Design.

Last year, he won the 2024 Freda Sack award, the highest honour from the International Society of Typographic Designers (ISTD), for his record sleeve design for SO:LO’s album At the End of the World, Plant a Tree. This project, a first record sleeve for Miller and debut vinyl for SO:LO (who are also friends), did a superb job of visually representing the album’s ambient music and environmental themes.

4. Rachel Gogel

Based in San Francisco, Rachel Gogel is an independent creative executive shaping the future of design at the intersection of brand, culture and technology. With roots in editorial design at publications such as GQ and The New York Times, Rachel brings a sophisticated approach to visual storytelling—creating clear hierarchies that guide readers through complex information while maintaining strong aesthetic integrity.

Since launching a namesake consultancy in 2020, Rachel has collaborated with global organisations including Airbnb and Dropbox, as well as women-founded ventures such as Chicken & Egg Films and Anew. Working in a fractional leadership capacity, Rachel helps teams navigate digital transformation and brand evolution.

Beyond consultancy, Rachel is a passionate educator and mentor, teaching at California College of the Arts and The School of The New York Times, and supporting emerging creatives through initiatives like ADPList and Talk to a Creative Director. Recently featured on Creative Boom to discuss valuing creative worth, Rachel continues to advocate for equity, inclusion and purpose in the design industry.

5. Marie Boulanger

Marie Boulanger is a London-based type designer whose practice exemplifies the intersection of artistic creativity and social consciousness. She’s currently leading the design team at Monotype.

Marie’s work is characterized by a distinctive duality that reflects her own personality; combining emotional intensity with analytical precision to create typography that is both punchy and delicate. Her typefaces, including Faubourg Display (which blends French Art Deco with eighteenth-century transitional serifs) and Aligre (a contemporary revival of Fleischman Antiqua), demonstrate her commitment to both historical reverence and contemporary innovation in letterform design.

6. Ingrid Picanyol

Ingrid Picanyol is a Barcelona-based graphic designer whose work reflects the creative energy and cultural sophistication of the Catalan design scene. She perceives in her work a certain way of looking at and understanding the world, and also a dose of “lateral thinking, caprice, and delirium”. Her portfolio spans cultural institutions, fashion brands, and publishing projects, each demonstrating her ability to create visual identities that respect local context while appealing to international audiences.

A prime example is her identity for the Masvell restaurant, for which she collaborated with typographer Noe Blanco to develop a custom typeface inspired by Bonaventura Bassegoda’s calligraphy. The resulting design honors the restaurant’s cultural heritage while creating a modern visual language that reflects its connection to the local community of Masnou.

7. Alec Tear

Based in Bristol, Alec Tear is a British independent designer and lettering artist. Known for his versatile graphic styles and his focus on concept-driven typography, he collaborates with a network of independent specialists and creative agencies. He’s received many awards for his work, including D&AD Pencils for projects such as Burger King Meltdown and Dieline Awards for packaging.

His portfolio website is particularly noteworthy, designed and built by Amsterdam-based studio noko. It features a distinctive toggle module that allows users to seamlessly navigate between his design and lettering work, and the site’s colors dynamically adapt to each project to highlight his vibrant work.

8. Wale Osunla

Wale Osunla (it’s pronounced ‘wah-lay”, not Whale) is a graphic designer based in Greater London whose output playfully blends creative exploration, textures and motion. Deeply passionate about fostering collaborating and community in younger (and older) creatives, he often gives talks at universities and events across the UK.

Since 2020, he’s been a full-time designer at Studio Moross, being told to saturate his colour choices while working on clients such as Riot Games, Kylie Minogue, Roundhouse and the British Film Institute. We especially loved his recent rebrand of elevenfiftyfive. When away from the screen, he’s steadily increasing his impressive collection of hats.

9. Chloe Scheffe

Based in Seattle, USA, Chloe Scheffe is an independent designer and art director. She began her editorial career at the New York Times Magazine, then went on to work on publications of all kinds, including Here, Interview, GQ, Wired, Lux, and WePresent.

In 2019, she was named a One Club Young Gun. In 2022, she partnered with Natalie Shields to launch Scheffe Shields, an award-winning independent design and illustration collaborative focused on printed matter. Together they produce work for clients like Phaidon, Nike, Tinashe, Tribeca Film Festival, and Interscope Records.

Chloe’s work is focused on world-building (deep storytelling), emphasising typography and the analogue. She loves humour and the public domain. Recent collaborators include Figma and A24.

10. Matt Wiley

Matt Willey is a graphic designer living in Brooklyn, New York. He was the art director of The New York Times Magazine from 2015-2020, before joining the New York office of Pentagram as a partner. In 2014 he was named ‘Designer of the Year’ by Creative Review, and was elected as a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI) in 2015.

In 2021 Matt launched the literary magazine INQUE with collaborator and editor Dan Crowe. More recently, he won the National Design award, a prestigious accolade for communication design excellence.

11. Martyna Wędzicka-Obuchowicz

Based in Gdańsk, Poland, Martyna Wędzicka-Obuchowicz is an experimental graphic designer, AGI member, artist and screenprint maker. Previously a co-founder of the .less studio, currently associated mainly with the glitch style and the possibilities offered by the office scanner. An ex-tutor, she often gives talks at events, conducts workshops and lectures.

Last year, Martynapartnered with Squarespace and It’s Nice That to celebrate the bold rise of neon and fluorescent hues in design. In a new website design inspired by the Vivid Glow trend, she embraced a “style that refuses to blend in”, by incorporating vibrant and contrasting colours and bold shapes, to craft a fun template that was both impactful and cohesive.

12. Alex Center

Alex Center is a Brooklyn-based brand designer and founder of CENTER, a strategic design consultancy that approaches branding as cultural intervention. As our recent article on his work designing Tom Holland’s non-alcoholic beer brand
shows, this work demonstrates how brand identities that drive commercial success through cultural relevance.

Previously, Alex worked for The Coca-Cola Company, helping build the brands vitaminwater, POWERADE and smartwater. Based in New York, he now partners with companies such as United Sodas of America, Apple, Good Light, Ayoh!, New Balance, BERO and Liquid Death.

13. Connor Campbell

Connor Campbell is a London-based motion designer who’s transitioned from a background in graphic design to founding his own graphic design and motion studio, working for clients such as Nike, MTV, Amazon, Vice and Universal Music.

His studio operates with a core team of three, expanding with independent motion designers for larger projects. Campbell emphasises the importance of early integration of motion into branding projects for the most impactful results, rather than it being an afterthought.

14. Lebassis

Leandro Assis, known as Lebassis, is a Brazilian lettering artist and art director based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, whose vibrant work for major brands like RuPaul’s Drag Race, YouTube, Nike, Netflix, and Google is deeply rooted in his personal journey as a black queer individual.

From a young age, his experience of being gay influenced his creative path, as he subconsciously developed an acute observational skill by attempting to alter his handwriting to appear “less feminine” and blend in. This early exercise in reinvention honed his ability to connect personality with typographic style, a core element of his current lettering approach.

If you want to discover more about his creative process and hear his thoughts on industry topics, check out his Substack.

15. Jessica Walsh

Jessica Walsh is the founder of &Walsh, a New York studio that blends graphic design with emotional storytelling to create brand experiences that resonate on human levels. An internationally recognised figure in design, she lectures globally and teaches at the School of Visual Arts, and her work has been featured in countless publications and exhibited in galleries and museums worldwide. She has collaborated with major clients such as Apple, Google, Netflix, The New York Times, and Adobe.

Beyond her studio work, Walsh is also known for her personal project, 40 Days of Dating, co-created with Timothy Goodman, which garnered over 12 million readers and huge media attention, leading to a book deal and film rights acquired by Warner Bros. She further champions the creative community through Ladies, Wine & Design, a mentorship program for women that has expanded to over 40 chapters globally. Last year she added yet another string to her bow, launching her own type foundry, Type Of Feeling.

16. Margot Lévêque

Margot Lévêque is a French type designer and type strategist currently based in New York. known for an elegant approach to identity systems that combines classical typographic principles with contemporary cultural needs.

After graduating from a design school in Paris with a Masters in Art Direction and Type Design, Margot went on to work with prestigious agencies and fashion labels including Vogue, Louis Vuitton, Pentagram, Prada, A24, &Walsh and Hermès Paris, and work closely with famous clients such as Phoebe Tonkin, Ariana Grande and Emma Chamberlain. She aims in her work to craft designs with “elegance, creativity, invention and beauty”.

17. Paul Watmough-Halim

Paul Watmough-Halim is the co-founder and ECD of Hyperfocus Brand Design Studio, an award-winning design agency based in Hamburg, Germany. He’s made a name for himself by consistently creating branded experiences that are relatable, bold, courageous, and surprising, with a particular passion for the cross-transferable mindset between brand and interactive design.

As a recognised industry speaker at prestigious events like D&AD, ADC, and OFFF festival, Paul has gained international recognition for his work, which has been featured in publications such as Visuelle, Brand Identity, Bounty Hunter, and Visual Journal. Most recently, we chatted to him about Hyperfocus’ work with creative recruitment agency Undiscovered.

18. Sarah Carlton

Sarah Carlton is a designer and entrepreneur known for founding KINSHIP, a family-run creative studio in County Durham specialising in branding and print design, particularly for magazines. Her aim has always been to produce design work she can be proud of, while also maintaining the flexibility she desired after starting a family.

In 2023, she co-founded Billy No Mates Coworking, a monthly informal co-working initiative designed for remote and lonely workers in the North East. She is also involved in other endeavours, including CYAN CIC, a community arts agency, and STRIKE, a women+ public art collective.

19. Tré Seals

Tré Seals is a graphic designer, typographer and founder of Vocal Type, a type foundry dedicated to increasing diversity and representation in the design industry. His journey began in 2016 when he discovered that only 3-3.5% of practicing designers in America are blacke. Inspired by a PRINT article titled “Black Designers: Still Missing in Action”, he decided to take action by creating typefaces that reflect minority culture and encourage diversity directly through their letterforms.

Based in Accokeek, Maryland, Tré’s foundry serves “creatives of colour who feel they don’t have a say in their industry” and aims to break the cycle of repetitive design born from a singular dominant perspective. His entrepreneurial spirit, influenced by watching his parents run their own business for 30 years, drives his mission to introduce non-stereotypical pieces of minority culture into design and create more empathy. Learn more in our interview with Tré.

20. Carla Palette

Carla Palette is an independent brand designer and art director based in Berlin whose approach to graphic design who has “an affliction for colour and controversy” and believes that “people-pleasing is boring, passive and inauthentic”. We’d want to include her on this list for her name alone. But we also love her work for beauty, fashion, food and lifestyle brands from all around the globe, such as her outstanding identity for furniture brand Tresi founded on radical honesty.