The 2010 Census arrived at a pivotal moment; America was more diverse than ever, and for the first time, the Census Bureau implemented a fully integrated communications plan to capture a true portrait of the nation. Over 18 months, I led design as part of Weber Shandwick’s team on the “It’s In Our Hands” campaign.

Rather than a single national design, we built a design system flexible enough to carry consistent visual logic across more than ten culturally specific toolkits. African American communities. Latino families. Asian Americans. Migrants. Immigrants. Native Americans. Populations with deep historical reasons to distrust a government form showing up at their door. Each toolkit used color psychology, culturally resonant imagery, and audience-specific messaging to meet people where they were. The design had to work for everyone, which meant it couldn’t look the same for everyone.

Our designs were translated into 20 languages and handed off to agencies nationwide. The national posters and brochures became the visual backbone of a campaign that generated 17 billion impressions, with fact sheets appearing in Getty Images news coverage across the country.

The campaign achieved a 74% national mail-back rate, finished $1.9 billion under budget, and earned an ARF David Ogilvy Gold for best multicultural campaign in the U.S.