These pages serve as a repository of MKN Design Studio’s articles, client projects, independent work, and products.

Careful, it’s a rabbit hole.

 

Use the search to find projects by type, or the dropdown to explore by group.

Graphis UNMUTED – Designers for Humanity

Independent Work

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Graphis Unmuted – Designers for Humanity
I entered this poster I designed into the Graphis, Unmuted. This poster interrogates political power by exposing the tension between spectacle and control. Drawing from historic propaganda, monarchical symbolism, and contemporary political theater, the work pairs oversized typography with a crowned skull to reveal how authority often conceals fragility and mortality beneath displays of dominance.

The “No Kings” concept responds to modern shifts toward unchecked power, linking the historic “divine right” of monarchies with today’s nationalist influences. Visually, an American star merges with a traditional crown containing a skull, reinforcing themes of fear, decay, and the performative nature of strength. Executed in a stark red, black, and white palette with compressed vertical stacking, the composition creates psychological pressure that mirrors the overwhelming weight of political messaging and challenges viewers to question the cost of blind allegiance.

 

  • Find my poster and many other submissions on the Graphics website.

    → UNMUTED: Designers for Humanity Submissions

  • No Kings tee is available for purchase on Cotton Bureau. All Cotton Bureau apparel comes in a variety of clothing types, styles, fits, sizes, materials, and colors.

    If you would like to purchase this as a poster, please contact MKN Design by email.

Legion Of Liberty – Book Cover Design

Client Work

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Legion Of Liberty – Book Cover Design
Legion of Liberty is satirical political noir about moral drift, complicity, and the seductions of proximity to power. As the story unfolds, liberty is revealed not as a pure ideal, but as something leveraged—protected on paper and constrained in practice.

As the story unfolds, liberty is revealed not as a pure ideal, but as something leveraged, protected on paper and constrained in practice, and the cover translates this tension through a minimalist, symbolic approach. Centered on the American eagle, a culturally immediate icon rendered with deliberate symmetry and control, the image initially reads as noble and authoritative. On closer inspection, its rigid geometry and high-contrast palette suggest institutional force, dominance, surveillance, and power insulated from consequence.

This fractured duality is made visible: the left side embodies the ideal of freedom, its talon grasping the American star as a symbol of unity and virtue, while the mirrored right side exposes moral drift and the seduction of power, exposes moral drift and the seduction of power, with a gold coin standing in for ideology. Even the tagline, “Making Bank from Freedom,” reinforces the novel’s satirical edge—underscoring a system that appears virtuous on the surface while concealing something transactional beneath.

The book’s title is set in Thrillers, designed by Natanael Gama from NDISCOVER, with Fino Sans by Ermin Medjedovic from TypeTogether used as the secondary typeface.

Purchase This Novel:
Legion of Liberty: Making Bank for Freedom, by Van Ledyard, can be purchased on Amazon for Kindle.

 

  • Van Ledyard
    Author

  • + Concept Development
    + Conceptual Translation
    + Design Direction
    + Narrative Distillation
    + Qualitative Research
    + Visual Identity

  • MKN Design Team:
    + Michael Nÿkamp, Design Director

    Stakeholder:
    + Van Ledyard, Author

Star Wonder

Independent Work

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Star Wonder
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night – Sarah Williams. Star Wonder paired with Suburban Rooftops print