With the 2026 PRINT Awards season officially underway, we’re excited to share our illustrious panel of judges. Our PRINT Awards Jury is comprised of leaders in the art and design industry, representing a diverse range of perspectives across fields. These experts have been entrusted with assessing each entry in their category, looking for originality, longevity, innovation, and craft. With these guideposts in mind, driven by their breadth of industry success and expertise, our jury members will have a keen eye for the shape of things to come in our industry.
Without further ado, meet our jurors for the categories of Advertising, Editorial, & Writing for Design and Annual Reports, Books, Covers/Jackets, Brochures & Catalogs.
Advertising, Editorial, & Writing for Design
Advertising, editorial, and writing for design are separate categories for entry this year. However, in practice, these skills often interlock, reinforce one another, and draw from shared principles—sharpening clarity, guiding attention, and creating a consistent voice across every touchpoint. Each discipline borrows techniques from the others to ensure the message is more coherent, engaging, and effective.
Our jury members across these three categories use the precision and usability of design writing in their work. At the heart is compelling storytelling, whether through persuasive advertising campaigns that pack an emotional impact or a written narrative that intrigues the reader through its structure, depth, and voice.
Benji Wiedemann // Executive Creative Director & Co-founder at Wiedemann Lampe
With over two decades of experience, Benji Wiedemann helps brands and organizations unlock cultural impact and define their role and influence in modern society. His work spans government consulting, amplifying cultural institutions such as the Louvre Abu Dhabi, the British Library, and New York State Parks, and guiding businesses through major transformations, including IMI Media and Etisalat’s transition to e&.
Jess Ulman // Senior Designer at Colossus
Jess Ulman brings an artful touch to her work across branding, illustration, web design, and editorial design. At Colossus, she led the forthcoming rebrand for the renowned performing arts institution Celebrity Series, and has lent her unique style to recent branding projects for Dream Recovery and Highspring.
Branding for Dream Recovery by Colossus and Jess Ulmann
Rob Vargas // Independent designer
Rob Vargas is a freelance creative director, designer, and illustrator. He was previously Global Executive Design Director of GQ, creative director at Bloomberg Businessweek, and has also held staff and freelance roles at The New York Times Magazine, New York Magazine, Highsnobiety, and Cosmopolitan.
In my work, I’m most excited to work across various disciplines within design and illustration, and to work within evolving parameters in a changing business landscape.
Rob Vargas
2025 Professional First Place in Advertising – Morphe – Holiday Drama | Pum Lefebure | Design Army
2025 Professional First Place in Editorial – HUE: The Magazine of FIT, the Fashion Institute of Technology | Alexander Isley | Alexander Isley Inc. Designers
Annual Reports, Books, Covers/Jackets & Entire Packages, Brochures & Catalogs
Design for annual reports, books, covers/jackets, brochures, and catalogs all share a common foundation: they are tangible communication systems that visually organize information to guide a reader through a structured story. Designers balance hierarchy, typography, imagery, pacing, and clarity to make complex content approachable and engaging.
Throughout their careers, our jury members in these categories have transformed content into experience, turning text and images into something readable, navigable, and emotionally resonant. They have a strong understanding of narrative flow—how a reader enters, moves through, and exits a piece—and they know that consistent visual systems create cohesion and excitement.
Sean Adams // Dean of Art and Communication at ArtCenter College of Design
Sean Adams is the author of nine books, including The Designer’s Dictionary of Color and How Design Makes Us Think. He’s an on-screen instructor for LinkedIn Learning, Domestika, and Adobe, and the only two-term AIGA national president in AIGA’s history.
Jason Ramirez // Art Director at Penguin Random House
Jason Ramirez is an award-winning art director. Before working at Penguin Random House, he worked with St. Martin’s Press and Rodrigo Corral Design. His work has earned recognition from AIGA Eye on Design, AIGA 50 Books | 50 Covers competition, the Type Directors Club, the New York Book Show, The Washington Post, Literary Hub, and Communication Arts and PRINT magazines.
Book cover designed by Jason Rimirez
Barbara de Wilde // Co-owner of Frenchtown Bookshop
Barbara de Wilde is the co-owner of the independent bookstore Frenchtown Bookshop in New Jersey. Over her 40-year design career, de Wilde has worked as a book jacket designer for Alfred A. Knopf, a design director for Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, a package designer for Nonesuch Records, an adjunct professor at the School of Visual Arts, and a product design director at The New York Times.
Design awards, like art exhibitions, are professional credentials. To have your work acknowledged by your peers is the very best sort of feedback. It is a way to say ‘we see you, we understand your work, and we are cheering for you.’
Barbara de Wilde
2025 Professional Honorees in Books, Covers/Jackets, Books, Entire Packages, Annual Reports, Brochures & Catalogs. Clockwise: Blueprint | Robin Bilardello | Harper Collins; The Interpretation Power of Memories | Yunqi Peng | Royal College of Art; The Future is Nuclear, Bruce Power Annual Report | Erin Grandmaison | Bruce Power, Fall Gala – Feast for the Soul | Johnny Selman | Selman
The 2026 PRINT Awards Early Bird Deadline is Thursday, December 11. Enter now for the best rate of the season.
The post From Cover to Cover: Introducing the PRINT Awards Jury for Editorial, Advertising & Publication Design appeared first on PRINT Magazine.