Vital City Print Journal

ART DIRECTION + PRINT DESIGN + LAYOUT +

Vital City is an online and print publication dedicated to improving civic life by finding great ideas and innovative research and making them available — and understandable — to those who shape urban policy in New York City.

Under Design for Progress, I led Art Direction for the photography used throughout 3 issues that covered different topics including drug use in the city, the relevancy of social science research, and the “Doom Loop” theory - in addition to laying out and designing the entire print book itself.

ISSUE 6 “ON DRUGS”

ISSUE 7 “DOES EVIDENCE MATTER?”

ISSUE 8 “IS THE URBAN DOOM LOOP FOR REAL?”

Agency :: Design for Progress (New York)
Client :: Vital City (New York City)
Creative Direction :: Paragini Amin
Art Direction + Design :: Rolando Sepulveda II
Operations + Project Management + Art Dir. Support :: Ansley Pentz
Original Vital City visual identity developed by Paragini Amin and Megan Magray

Design for Progress

VISUAL IDENTITY + BRAND DESIGN + WEBSITE +

Design for Progress is a woman-owned, brown- and Black-led, strategy and creative firm dedicated to nonprofit, philanthropic, and mission-driven efficacy. Newly employed as the agency’s Senior Designer beginning September 2023, my very frist project was to conceptualize, design, and develop a visual identity and new website for the firm within a month’s time.

With a rather short timeline to repackage years worth of nonprofit work into a new identity and website, complete with reimagined case studies, the final result displayed a creative agency that is fluid, moving, and kind of weird - in a way that works.

Agency :: Design for Progress (New York)
Creative Direction + Design :: Rolando Sepulveda II

Monstrosity and the Obscene/Off-Scene! (OUTsider 2025)

EVENT DESIGN + BRAND DESIGN + ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN +

Queer and trans artists have embraced the concept of “Monstrosity” as way to denounce the dominant systems of oppression and refuse being disciplined into normalcy. This refusal of the “normal” entails a decoding and a re-imagining of popular culture’s proclivity to equate the monstrous and the freakish with sexual deviancy and hysteria through vampires, werewolves, witches, and other such figurations.

For OUTsider’s 2025 Festival “Monstrosity and the Obscene Off/Scene!”, I conceptualized a mini-brand identity that utilizes brash color, monstrous photo illustrations, and obscenely skewed type to express the festival theme which seeks to lift up creative responses to what is deemed filthy, offensive, and less than human in mainstream culture.

Organization :: OUTsider (Austin, Texas)
Creative Direction + Design + Photography :: Rolando Sepulveda II

Vital City Brand Guidelines
VISUAL IDENTITY + BRAND DESIGN + ART DIRECTION +

Through a policy journal, timely in-depth reports and a focus on data transparency, Vital City provides decision-makers, both inside and outside of government, with actionable strategies for building and sustaining cities that are healthy, vibrant and safe for all.

After over two years of growing their audience, Vital City underwent a brand refresh with Design for Progress that needed an updated Brand Guideline to accompany all the changes and transformations. Under the Creative Direction of Vital City’s original Brand Designer, I designed a new Guideline that did just that.

Agency :: Design for Progress (New York)
Client :: Vital City (New York City)
Creative Direction :: Paragini Amin
Art Direction + Design :: Rolando Sepulveda II
Copywriting :: Ansley Pentz and Chris Edley III
Project Management :: Ansley Pentz
Original Vital City visual identity developed by Paragini Amin and Megan Magray

OUTsider Queer Transmedia Art Festival

EVENT DESIGN + BRAND DESIGN + ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN +

OUTsider is an Austin-based transmedia nonprofit that celebrates the bold originality and creative nonconformity of the LGBTQ+ communities through the presentation of provocative, overlooked and out-of-the-box film, dance, theater, performance art, music, writing and visual art.

Through its annual festival and conference, OUTsider unites queer artists, audiences and scholars from around the globe to exchange ideas, ignite conversations, transcend boundaries and experience new pleasures through artistic discovery.

Every year OUTsider’s Festival and Conference center around a theme that’s conceptualized by its Artistic Directors. As a Staff Photographer and Design Director of the Organization, I’ve maintained a photographic archive of the festival’s showcases since 2018 and have developed the general brand identity of the organization along with the creation of temporary brand identities for each festival theme since 2023.

ARTIST SPOTLIGHTS FOR SOCIAL

For all communications and marketing needs, I conceptualize and design numerous assets that include social media posts, web design/updates, print banners, print programs, emails, festival badges, and merch.

Organization :: OUTsider (Austin, Texas)
Creative Direction + Design + Photography :: Rolando Sepulveda II

Law Office of Daniela Nanau, P.C.

WEB DESIGN + MINI BRAND +

Daniela Nanau is a New York-based employment and civil rights attorney representing individuals and groups of employees who face discrimination, harassment, wage theft, wrongful termination and other injustice on the job. Daniela also represents students who are victims of sexual harassment, sexual assault, gender discrimination and retaliation at the college and graduate school level.

Under Design for Progress, I created a new website for Daniela that reflected her fierce passion and bold advocacy.

Agency :: Design for Progress (New York)
Client :: Law Office of Daniela Nanau, P.C. (New York City)
Creative Direction + Design :: Rolando Sepulveda II
Project Management + Communications :: Ansley Pentz

Rolando is a designer and photographic artist from South Texas. He brings a number of in-house working and volunteer years across different types of nonprofits, including architecture, public/higher education, LGBTQ+ advocacy, film, and visual/performing arts. Currently he works across Los Angeles, Austin, and New York City.