User Journey w/ Sevy

E11: Paula Scher

Paula Scher is a designer, painter, and educator. Since 1991, she has been Partner at influential New York City design firm Pentagram [https://www.pentagram.com/], and she’s the creative mind behind some of America’s most iconic brand campaigns. She’s made more than 2,000 album covers for artists like Billy Joel, Leonard Bernstein, and Bob Dylan — while her celebrated map paintings have inspired books, screenprints, and exhibitions. Her work’s been shown worldwide, with a new major exhibition, Type Is Image [https://www.die-neue-sammlung.de/en/ausstellung/paula-scher-type-is-image/], on view through April 2026 at Die Neue Sammlung in Munich. Paula joins Sevy to trace the arc of her groundbreaking career, from doing things in college that you shouldn’t discuss on podcasts to how designer intuition runs the show at Pentagram — and why. Hint: it has something to do with needing a vision.

E10: John Waters

Season 01's finale is made in partnership with The Hopkins Review (THR), the award-winning journal of literature and culture from the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University. Follow along with a selection of images from the conversation, and pre-order Volume 18 now, at hopkinsreview.com/john-waters [https://hopkinsreview.com/john-waters]. Listener discretion is advised. John Waters is a filmmaker, actor, artist, and writer. Crowned the “Pope of Trash” by William S. Burroughs in 1986, his cult films include Pink Flamingos (1972), Desperate Living (1977), Polyester (1981), and Hairspray (1988). John is the author of eight books, including the autobiography Shock Value (1981), the memoir Role Models (2010), Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America (2014), and his recent debut novel Liarmouth: A Feel-Bad Romance, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2022. For over 30 years, John’s visual art — his photography, sculpture, prints, and installations, have re-contextualized art, pop culture, and life as we generally know it. His works are in the collections of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the New Museum in New York, among others. Dora Malech is the editor in chief of The Hopkins Review and a professor in the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. Her poems appear in publications that include The New Yorker, Poetry, and the Best American Poetry. Her fifth book of poetry, Trying × Trying, is forthcoming from the Carnegie Mellon University Press in Fall 2025. To celebrate John as THR’s next featured cover artist, he joins Sevy and Dora for a freewheeling conversation through the people and themes that have defined the American iconoclast’s career. From playing “car accident” in junkyards as a child to re-trying LSD in Provincetown at 70, hear John’s stories as told through a selection of his own creations. User Journey w/ Sevy is presented by the Society of Typographic Arts [https://typographicarts.org/], Chicago’s oldest professional association for design. Learn more at userjourney.show [https://userjourney.show/].

E09: Jill Gage

Jill Gage is Custodian of the John M. Wing Foundation on the History of Printing and the Bibliographer for British Literature and History at the Newberry Library, Chicago’s independent research library, founded in 1887. In addition to conducting research, conserving artifacts, and teaching classes, Jill is preparing her next exhibition, Making an Impression: Immigrant Printing in Chicago, which is free and open to the public from December 12, 2024 to March 29, 2025. She holds a Ph.D. in English Language and Literature from University of London and an M.S. in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Jill joins Sevy to talk about filling the gaps of print history with artifacts spanning 15th century incunables to 21st century artist books. They also discuss what the Newberry’s vast archives can offer both students and professionals today, including the stuff you can’t learn online. So, you know — the good stuff. Just don't try to check out Popol Vuh. User Journey w/ Sevy is presented by the Society of Typographic Arts [typographicarts.org], Chicago’s oldest professional association for design. Learn more at userjourney.show [userjourney.show].

E08: Elaine Lopez

Elaine Lopez is an independent designer and educator who is an Assistant Professor and Associate Director of the BFA in Communication Design program at Parsons School of Design in New York City. At her studio, LoPress Press, Elaine collaborates with cultural and academic institutions to explore the intersection of culture, identity, and equity within the field of design. She holds a BFA from the University of Florida and an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design — both in Graphic Design. Elaine joins Sevy to talk about navigating the industry as a first-generation Cuban American woman, what a design education can offer students in our technological age, and why the current state of human-centered design is… complicated. User Journey w/ Sevy is presented by the Society of Typographic Arts [https://typographicarts.org/], Chicago’s oldest professional association for design. Learn more at userjourney.show [https://userjourney.show/].

E07: Caryl Pagel

Caryl Pagel is a poet, editor, and author of four books, most recently Free Clean Fill Dirt (University of Akron Press, 2022). She is co-founder, editor, and publisher at independent American house Rescue Press, as well as director of the Cleveland State University Poetry Center’s NEOMFA program. Caryl holds a BA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and MFAs from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Caryl joins Sevy to talk about the (mostly) invisible art of editing — including her philosophy of "generative publishing," book-making as a social practice, and what haircuts have in common with design. User Journey w/ Sevy is presented by the Society of Typographic Arts [https://typographicarts.org/], Chicago's oldest professional association for design. Learn more at userjourney.show [https://userjourney.show/].