Kudos

Testimonials

Featured in GDUSA’s 2021 Responsible Designers (Graphic Design USA) (Full article)

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Thank you Karen Parry/Black Graphics. You delivered a complex design project on brief, with fiercely determined dedication and complete understanding of the communications strategy. Great job!

Caroline Jacobson

Oxfam International Independent Commission

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Black Graphics is my go-to graphic designer for a wide variety of projects. Technical projects that need visuals to help tell a compelling story always benefit from Karen's expertise and attention to detail. She ensures readability through elegant layouts and creates custom graphics and illustrations that complement and clarify the content. As the Chief Communications Officer at a busy nonprofit organization, I find Karen's flexibility with both schedule and budget indispensable in fulfilling our deadlines and deliverables. She is a consummate collaborator who asks the right questions to make our publications better. And Karen is always improving her skills. For example, she recently trained herself on PDF accessibility that allows people with visual disabilities to better access our digital materials.

Kim Arroyo Williamson

Chief Communications Officer at ChangeLab Solutions

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Karen’s experience and expertise were invaluable. As an artist her talent and aesthetic elevated our content. She asked questions which ultimately helped us structure our materials in a flexible manner. Her consultation broadened our understanding of design elements and the design process, all of which informed the quality and span of the final products. She took our brand style and expanded it to a visual language giving us symbols to help clarify content, create cross-document coherence, and provide a linguistic shortcut. Karen updated our look with crisp clean graphics and provided visual cues that intuitively guided the reader and reduced the need for written directions. We are educators and our materials can be verbose. Karen’s designs maximized the white space and minimized the density of the content and made our content more appealing and accessible. It changed the experience of the reader. When our materials are more engaging, it increases their use, which increases our business opportunities and ability to positively impact the future of young people and achieve our mission.

On top of everything else Karen was an absolute delight to work with. I left our meetings relieved by the progress made and excited about the next steps. If you have the opportunity to work with Karen, take advantage of it. You won’t regret it.

Daphannie Stephens

Chief Program Officer, ConnectEd, The National Center for College & Career

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Karen is that rare blend of a visual person who is also a strategic thinker. She doesn't just see how things should look, she sees what they should mean. Her design is always informed by an understanding of the organization's goals and audience. Having worked with Karen both at an agency and as independent freelancers, I can say that she is also fast, reliable, and fun to work with.

Sharene Azimi

Communications Director at Institute for Nonprofit News

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Karen Parry is a genius! More than that, she's a hard-working and conscientious genius. I'm constantly impressed and inspired by her artistic vision, her technical skills, and her tenacious attention to detail – it's truly a pleasure to work with and learn from her. Her expertise is evident in every step of the process, from conceptualizing the overall format of a publication to choosing the perfect font or color. She's gone to great lengths to ensure that our products meet our goals, even under a nonprofit's budget constraints – and she has brought them to life for us in ways I could never have imagined. Karen is a topflight designer with a keen understanding of what it takes to create an effective communications tool. Her professionalism makes for a wonderful collaboration, and her work is beautiful. I recommend her unreservedly!

Carrie Spector

Public Health Institute

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Working with Karen Parry and Black Graphics has not only resulted in the most satisfying and persuasive publications that I have ever helped to produce, but has also given me a graduate level education in effective communications. Karen grasps that central truth so elusive for most non-profits: less is more. Karen will shape your publication so that it can be skimmed or read carefully, and yet communicate key concepts completely in either instance. She also has an exquisite aesthetic sensibility, and you will find people picking your publications off a crowded table. Perhaps the greatest testament to her skills comes from consumers of the publications we created together. I have walked behind members of Congress on the street and watched them devour our publications, and I have seen members of the public read them as eagerly. I could not recommend Karen more highly, and would welcome anyone considering her services to view the products we produced and to contact me for a reference. She really is that good.

Jad Daley

Coordinator Eastern Forest Partnership

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I am always just astonished how clear you are! I’ve never had a project where I was guided so clearly! And I’ve produced three CD recordings and three booklets...so I know what chaotic work means. Thank you!

Gisela Knorr

Bridesang

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Black Graphics did a superb job of taking The Highlands Coalition's request for help in creating a brochure from a vague concept to creating a beautiful and powerful tool. We needed a brochure that succinctly told our story, primarily to legislators, to help us achieve the goal of getting the federal government to pass the Highlands Conservation Act at a time when environmental legislation was very unpopular in congress. Without fail, the majority of the legislators we handed our brochure to compliment us on how "outstanding" our publication looked. Best of all, Black Graphics helped communicate the thrust of our message just by reading the headings rather than having to wade through endless pages of factoids. The factoids were for those who had time to read them. Did our brochure work? You bet it did! Thank you Black Graphics for playing an instrumental roll in helping us get the Highlands Conservation Act passed by Congress and passed into law by President Bush.

Richard Whiteford

Outreach Coordinator Highlands Coalition

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The brochure looks great! Thank you again for all your care and patience putting this together... it seemed like there were little hurdles at nearly every step of the way, but you overcame each one with grace and professionalism.

Nicole Nedeff

Monterey Pine Forest Watch