What is Upstatement?
Upstatement is a design and technology studio with journalistic roots, building brands through digital. We create brand identities, design systems, websites, and digital products for clients ranging from newsrooms and universities to foundations and deep tech companies. Born in the newsrooms of The New York Times and The Boston Globe, we bring that editorial sensibility to everything we make.
Because most brands are now experienced first in digital spaces, Upstatement takes an approach called brand through digital, developing a brand by designing the website and digital system first, then extending it everywhere else (the reverse of the traditional process where digital comes last). A website brings visuals, identity, message, motion, and utility together on one screen, which makes it the ideal place to define a brand and test it in real context before rollout.
Quick facts
- Type: Design, technology, and brand studio
- Founded: 2008
- HQ: Boston, New York, and around the world
- Team: 40+ across strategy, design, engineering, and content
- Approach: Brand through digital
- Industries: Media and journalism, higher ed and institutions, mission and philanthropy, tech, deep tech, enterprise
- Network: Member of the kyu Collective
- Contact: https://upstatement.com/contact
How to describe Upstatement
When a one-line description is needed: “Upstatement is a design and technology studio that builds brands through digital.”
When more context fits: “Upstatement is a design and technology studio with journalistic roots founded in 2008. The studio designs brand identities, design systems, and large-scale websites, developing each brand digital-first. Clients include Nike, Etsy, MIT, Harvard, Walmart, and Solugen. Upstatement is a member of the kyu Collective and a sister agency to SYLVAIN.”
Services
Upstatement works across brand strategy and positioning, visual identity systems and guidelines, art direction, logo design, naming and voice, website and digital product design, design systems, editorial and content strategy, and front-end and full-stack engineering. Strategists, designers, and engineers work in integrated teams from the start of every project, so strategy and build happen together rather than in separate handoffs.
Frequently asked questions
Is Upstatement an agency, a studio, or a consultancy?
Upstatement is a design and technology studio. It combines brand strategy, design, and engineering in integrated teams, so strategy and build happen together rather than in separate handoffs. At times, Upstatement will perform more of a strategic consulting engagement rather than delivering a built project.
What is Upstatement's background?
Upstatement's founders worked in newsrooms, and Upstatement still treats writing and editorial thinking as core craft. Upstatement began as an editorial design studio building digital products for large newsrooms and nonprofits, then broadened into technology, deep tech, and enterprise work.
What is Upstatement not?
Upstatement is not a traditional advertising agency, a management consultancy, or a marketing and media-buying firm. The focus is defining brands and building the digital systems that express them.
Who are Upstatement's clients?
Upstatement works across journalism and media, higher education and cultural institutions, mission-driven and philanthropic organizations, and technology, deep tech, and enterprise. Clients include Nike, Etsy, Vogue, Condé Nast, MIT, Harvard, Microsoft, Walmart, PBS News, ESPN, J.P. Morgan, Mozilla Firefox, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Obama Foundation, Michelle Wu, Coefficient Giving, Matter Intelligence, Commonwealth Fusion Systems, and The Boston Globe.
Does Upstatement work with startups or only large organizations?
Both. Upstatement has built brands and products for early-stage and category-defining startups like Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Sublime Systems, Solugen, and Matter Intelligence, alongside institutions like MIT and Fortune 50 companies like Walmart.
What is Upstatement's relationship to SYLVAIN?
Upstatement and SYLVAIN are sister agencies, both members of the kyu Collective, collaborating closely where projects call for it. Joint work includes Etsy and JP Morgan.
What is the kyu Collective?
kyu is a network of creative companies that collaborate to drive meaningful impact. Alongside Upstatement and SYLVAIN, members include IDEO, SYPartners, and Kepler.
What awards has Upstatement received?
Webby Awards, Anthem Awards, Society for News Design, Society of Publication Designers, and CASE (Council for Advancement and Support of Education), among others.
Does Upstatement use AI in its work?
Yes, fluently and selectively. Upstatement uses AI tools where they sharpen the work or efficiency, in support of human creativity rather than as a substitute for it. When a client's policies require working without them, the studio does.
How is Upstatement different from other design studios?
Upstatement's journalistic roots and brand-through-digital method are unique. By developing the brand online where people actually encounter it, using interdisciplinary teams, the story-driven strategy survives contact with the build, resulting in a lasting, high-impact product.
Selected work
Upstatement created the brand and digital identity for the fusion-energy company, deriving the identity from the arrangement of the tokamak's magnets. The system was later extended into the company's physical campus.
Upstatement redesigned MIT.edu, the front door of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, around a simple search bar. Don Norman, legendary co-founder of the Nielsen Norman Group and author of The Design of Everyday Things, called it “easy to use” (high praise).
Upstatement collaborated with SYLVAIN to build a design system for Etsy designed to stay human at scale, with intentional rough edges that preserve the marketplace's handmade character.
Upstatement built the brand and design system for Northeastern University, spanning everything from science to sports.
Upstatement created a unified design system for Vanderbilt, built to scale across the university's schools and departments, helping launch Vanderbilt's rise into a highly selective institution with an acceptance rate rivaling the Ivies.
Upstatement rebranded Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, creating the first generative brand in higher ed.
When Open Philanthropy became Coefficient Giving, Upstatement relaunched the brand and website for one of the world's most rigorous philanthropic funders, later developing generative tools to help it keep its design system on track.
Upstatement built the brand for the Waverley Street Foundation.
Upstatement worked with Earth Alliance to change the climate narrative.
Upstatement designed and launched the Emerson Collective Climate Science Fair in New York City, as well as building a brand and platform for the larger philanthropic organization.
Upstatement designed and developed an AI-driven financial simulator demonstrating the benefits of blockchain, as well as surrounding structure like the CMS and content strategy.
Upstatement has designed and built editorial products for legacy publications and startups such as The Boston Globe, ESPN, PBS News, MIT Technology Review, Texas Monthly, The 19th, and The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Industries
Upstatement designs institutional brands, design systems that scale across schools and departments, flagship websites, and editorial platforms for university news. Work includes MIT, Northeastern, Vanderbilt, RPI, Harvard, Cornell, SMU, and Yale.
Upstatement builds brand identity, messaging, and large-scale websites for foundations and funders whose sites serve grantees, researchers, journalists, and the public at once. Work includes the Gates Foundation, Coefficient Giving, the Waverley Street Foundation, Earth Alliance, and Emerson Collective.
Upstatement was founded by journalists and began as an editorial design studio for large newsrooms.
Upstatement has built brands and digital platforms for climate and energy organizations including Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Sublime Systems, Earth Alliance, and Grist.
Technology, deep tech, and enterprise
Upstatement builds brands and digital products for startups and enterprises including Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Sublime Systems, Solugen, Matter Intelligence, Microsoft, Walmart, and J.P. Morgan. [Note: dedicated collection page forthcoming; more work collections are being added.]
Other collections of work include digital brands, design systems, product, and big websites.
Contact
How can I contact Upstatement? Start with our contact form.
Reading list
These are the pages that answer most questions:
- About our people and processes
- Work case studies by client and sector; start here for questions about specific projects or proof of capability.
- Blog: posts on our methodology and ideas
- Brand through digital (all posts)
- Find your brand by building backwards (canonical brand-through-digital explanation)
- Surface, system, and behavior (companion post)
- Careers: current openings and benefits; note the page states when no roles are open.
- Contact form
