Chermayeff & Geismar & Haviv


Chermayeff & Geismar & Haviv is a New York-based branding and graphic design firm. It is currently led by partners Tom Geismar and Sagi Haviv.

About

It was founded in 1957 by Yale graduates Ivan Chermayeff and Tom Geismar. The firm has designed logos for such companies as Pan Am, Mobil Oil, PBS, Chase Bank, Barneys New York, The Museum of Modern Art, Xerox, Smithsonian Institution, NBC, Cornell University, National Geographic, State Farm, and many others. Ivan Chermayeff and Tom Geismar were awarded the AIGA Medal in 1979. Chermayeff died on December 3, 2017 at the age of 85.
In 2006, designer Sagi Haviv became the third partner at the firm. In 2013 Haviv's name was added to the masthead and the firm became known as Chermayeff & Geismar & Haviv. Designer Mackey Saturday joined the firm as a principal in 2016.
In recent years, the firm created identities for the United States Olympic & Paralympic Museum, the US Open tennis tournament, Dick Wolf’s Wolf Entertainment, Animal Planet, Impossible Aerospace, Hearst Corporation, the Southern Poverty Law Center, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Conservation International, the Women's Tennis Association, Harvard University Press, State Farm, Grupo Imagen TV, L.A. Reid's Hitco Entertainment, Leonard Bernstein at 100, CourseHero, ClearMotion, Nanotronics,, Flatiron Health and other major institutions.
The firm is known for the exhibits and environmental art installations it has designed, including the Ellis Island Immigration Museum, the Statue of Liberty Museum, two World's Fair pavilions, and the red number 9 at 9 West 57th Street in New York City. In 2008, the new Star-Spangled Banner exhibit designed by the firm opened at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. The firm also designed the Kennedy Center Honors medal,
and designs motion graphics, such as the titles for the Emmy Award-winning PBS documentary series Carrierand in 2009, a motion graphics display for Alicia Keys’ annual fundraiser for her Keep a Child Alive Foundation.

Recently Published Books

In 2018 Sagi Haviv, Tom Geismar and Ivan Chermayeff co-authored Identity: Chermayeff & Geismar & Haviv. The book was published by Standards Manual.
In 2011 Haviv, Geismar and Ivan Chermayeff co-authored the book Identify: Basic Principles of Identity Design in the Iconic Trademarks of Chermayeff & Geismar. The book was published by Print magazine's book imprint,.

National Design Award

In October 2014 the National Design Award for Lifetime Achievement was awarded to Tom Geismar and Ivan Chermayeff by the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum.

Visual Identities Designed