In 2025, Stanford Graduate School of Business marked its Centennial—a milestone that invited not just celebration, but reflection. For a school defined by ideas in motion and impact over time, the question wasn’t how to commemorate 100 years, but how to express continuity: between past and future, tradition and reinvention, individual lives and collective progress.
We created an eye-catching and unique cover. A pattern of lines set in metallic foil creates a lattice that sparks energy and draws the eye across the page. The abstract shapes are a deconstruction of the “100” from our centennial logo — becoming an easter egg for our readers.
The red “Centennial Issue” eyebrow above the masthead distinguishes this issue from others, and a simple and impactful typographic coverline sits front and center. The timeless and brand-aligned palette of red and black typography set onto a bold white background nods to our identity as a school, and sets the perfect stage for the metallic foil as it catches the light.
The spine and rear cover of the magazine continue the palette and round out this issue with familiar features, including a typographic “word wall” that hints at the magazine’s contents.
Supplemental Material
To illuminate the cover in context, we’ve provided the digital cover and Centennial logo.
Digital Cover
A challenge for our team was how to capture the reflective and bright qualities of the cover’s foil in a digital format. We decided to use a desaturated, rainbow gradient to mimic the movement of the light on the foil. At the link, you’ll see the cover in relation to the rest of the magazine.
Centennial Logo
Benches found at the center of campus that have curved panels of wood that inspired the concentric circle motif.
The centennial logo was designed to reflect and complement the existing GSB Brand Guide. Using radiating circles – inspired by campus elements – to create a unique typographic solution, the logo feels energetic and familiar.
These concentric circles, as part of our existing brand guide, are meant to exhibit an organic and flowing expression of ideas and how those ideas creatively adapt and spread.
Examples of the radiating circle graphic element from the existing GSB Brand Guide next to the Centennial logo.