Debra Nichols Design

de Young Museum

Skin Deep

The ethos of San Francisco’s de Young Museum is embedded in its copper skin and in architecturally integrated donor recognition.

San Francisco’s de Young Museum had been closed to the public since 2000 after being damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. After two bond issues for its reconstruction failed, it looked as though the museum might never reopen.

Pacific Bell Park

Jury Award
Pacific Bell Park, Debra Nichols Design

The scope of this project encompassed the complete graphic design and signage for a new downtown baseball stadium and included logo design, graphic imagery, and all directional, informational, code, identification, and concession signage. A grille motif complements the architecture by expanding on themes of natural light and exposed structure. The logo celebrates the unique San Francisco experience of a waterfront ballpark where a home run to right field just might land in the bay.

Debra Nichols Design

Debra Nichols

1998 SEGD Fellow

Debra Nichols found her artform at the intersection of architecture, communication, and art. Her approach is integrative, synthesizing elegant and energetic design with strategic marketing and smart problem solving. She believes that for anything to truly succeed, to create the spirit of the place, and to contribute to life in a meaningful way, it must be beautiful.

Debra Nicols, Deborah Nicols Design
Debra Nichols Design
San Francisco

de Young Museum

Honor Award
de Young Museum, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, Debra Nichols Design

de Young Museum Signage and Environmental Graphics

San Francisco’s de Young Museum had been closed to the public since 2000 after being damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. Designed by Fong & Chan and Herzog & de Meuron architects, it reopened in September 2005 on the same site in Golden Gate Park.

Environmental graphics were inspired by the building’s unique copper skin, a quilt of 7,200 panels that were punched and embossed to suggest light filtering through a canopy of leafy trees.

Debra Nichols Design

St. Vincent de Paul Free Dining Room

Lot with a Little Award
St. Vincent de Paul Free Dining Room, Debra Nichols Design

The St. Vincent de Paul Free Dining Room in San Rafael, Calif., has offered 350 meals a day, 365 days a year, for more than 25 years. Relying on monetary donations, volunteer help, and donated food, it offers its clients a warm meal in a safe environment, augmented with basic necessities such as counseling, clothing, and emotional support.

Operating out of a run-down Gold Rush-era building, the facility had poor lighting, holes in the floor, outdated amenities, and an overall depressing environment.

Debra Nichols Design
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