Emily Oberman is a graphic designer who has shaped some of the world’s most recognizable and beloved brands. Her work crosses disciplines and encompasses visual identity, motion graphics, brand strategy, naming, packaging, editorial, and advertising.
Perhaps best known for her work in the entertainment industry, Emily has designed the titles for Saturday Night Live for the past 27 years—one of many long-standing relationships with iconic entertainment brands like NBC, Warner Bros, Warner Music Group, DC, and Amazon Prime Video. Her work goes beyond brand identity to touch many of the shows and movies that have become part of the fabric of our culture, including The Tonight Show, the Harry Potter Wizarding World and Fantastic Beasts franchises, Ready Player One, and Justice League. More recently, her work has been featured in critically acclaimed Netflix series like Cheer and Last Chance U.
Emily’s work is often characterized by her use of language and humor to make an emotional connection. Whether developing brand strategy and visual language for a global icon like Fisher-Price or crafting a new identity for a startup like Serif, an LGBTQ+ networking space, Emily always strives for something with wit and heart that speaks to our shared humanity.
A native of Yonkers, New York, Emily studied design and filmmaking at the Cooper Union School of Art in New York City. She began her design career at the legendary studio M&Co., working with Tibor Kalman to create work for Knoll, Wieden+Kennedy, Benetton’s critically acclaimed magazine, Colors, and Talking Heads, for whom they made the award-winning music video for “(Nothing But) Flowers.”
Before joining Pentagram, Emily co-founded the design studio Number Seventeen in 1993, which operated for (coincidentally, perhaps) seventeen years, where she worked for such clients as Benetton, NBC, MTV, HBO, and Condé Nast.
Since joining Pentagram in 2012, Emily’s work has spanned a wide array of industries, from expanding further into entertainment (Kevin Hart’s production company Hartbeat and the Russo brothers’ AGBO) to motion graphics (nine years of campaigns for the Film Independent Spirit Awards) to restaurants and hospitality (the Michelin-starred Cote Korean Steak House) to culture and non-profit (social justice organization Dream.org) to health and wellness (the menopause care startup Phenology) to products and retail (the rebrand of American Girl). Her work has even ventured beyond Earth with the space flight company Virgin Galactic.
In 2022, Emily was awarded the AIGA Medal, graphic design’s highest honor for her work throughout her career. She has also been honored by Communication Arts, the Type Directors Club, and the Art Directors Club, among others. In 2016 she was chosen by Fast Company as one of the year’s 100 most creative people in business. She has taught at numerous institutions, including the graduate program of Yale University School of Art, the Cooper Union, Parsons, the School of Visual Arts.
Most recently, Emily has led classes for the Communication Design program at the City College of New York, which recruits and supports design students from underrepresented communities to participate in a portfolio masterclass at Pentagram.
