USA – New & Improved?

W+K12, a creative school based in Portland, Oregon, is an experiment launched by design agency Wieden+Kennedy -- its designers, writers and strategic thinkers collaborate on client projects under the guidance of managing director Byron Oshiro and creative directors Tyler Whisnand and Hal Curtis.

"Lincoln is very much a man for these times, his beliefs and values hold strong to this day. I was thinking of a way to give a new iconic value to the lowly penny. American history is an interesting way to describe what America is like today. I like to think there is a little bit of Lincoln in all Americans. I also thought it was funny to mess with the American flag as a design exercise. I liked that the idea of endlessly designing the flag is both disrespectful and optimistic."

"My dream is for all Americans to reach out to the world and inspire everyone they touch to come together and rebuild a new world of optimism, joy and shared responsibility. Actions speak louder than ads."

"My dream is for all Americans to reach out to the world and inspire everyone they touch to come together and rebuild a new world of optimism, joy and shared responsibility. Actions speak louder than ads."

"Che Guevara has become T-shirt shorthand for counterculture -- most people in a Che T are oblivious to who he really was and are just celebrating the rebel in us all. In reality, Che went from being a doctor to a murderer in a wrongheaded, desperate attempt to change the world. The Communist Revolution he believed in didn't work -- and were he alive today, he would have to face that fact. Knowing that, the question is: Who would Che wear on his T-shirt? Who and what would (or could) he put his faith in?"