Join us as Person Place Thing host Randy Cohen interviews Bobby C. Martin Jr. in a live recording of the popular public radio series.
Bobby C. Martin Jr. is co-founder of Champions Design, a branding and design agency headquartered in New York City.
He sets the relentless standard of design and vision for the agency he founded, with Jennifer Kinon, in 2010. Together they have partnered with a wide range of clients such as Amazon, Apple, Dartmouth College, Girl Scouts, MTV, the National Basketball Association and The Studio Museum in Harlem.
Martin recently illustrated his first children’s book “Have I Ever Told You Black Lives Matter” (Tilbury House). In 2020, he was featured in the renowned design publication, Eye Magazine’s iconic 100th issue.
He has lectured about brand identity around the world, sat on numerous awards juries, and has been a special guest on Design Matters, Design Observer and NPR’s Studio 360. Martin served as a board member of AIGA/NY from 2006-08, and the board of the Type Directors Club from 2014-2021. In 2019, Champions Design was named one of the 30 Most Important Companies in Design by Fast Company. Bobby Martin has won numerous international awards from the AIGA, Art Directors Club, Communication Arts, D&AD, and the TDC, among others. He is a graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University, and earned an MFA from the School of Visual Arts where he currently serves on the faculty.
Randy Cohen’s first professional work was writing humor pieces, essays, and stories for newspapers and magazines (The New Yorker, Harpers, the Atlantic, Young Love Comics). His first television work was writing for “Late Night With David Letterman” for which he won three Emmy awards. His fourth Emmy was for his work on Michael Moore’s “TV Nation.” He received a fifth Emmy as a result of a clerical error, and he kept it. For twelve years he wrote “The Ethicist,” a weekly column for the New York Times Magazine. In 2010, his first play, “The Punishing Blow,” ran at New York’s Clurman Theater. His most recent book, “Be Good: how to navigate the ethics of everything,” was published by Chronicle. He is currently the creator and host of Person Place Thing, a public radio program.
Person Place Thing is an interview show based on the idea that people are especially engaging when they speak, not directly about themselves, but about something they find meaningful. Guests talk about one person, one place, and one thing of particular interest to them. The result: surprising stories from great talkers.