Since 2002, Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch, co-founders of the design and architecture firm Roman and Williams, have spent their careers re-defining modern design to be warmer, and to embrace the history and narratives of objects and places.

Their projects have had an enormous and often disruptive impact on their clients’ businesses. Their transformation of The Ace Hotel, the Boom Boom Room at the Standard Hotel, and the historic Chicago Athletic Club have all garnered praise for their attention to detail and sense of atmosphere.

Standefer and Alesch, are now working on the re-design of the British Galleries at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and will be opening their own business called The Guild, where they’ll be selling homeware, art supplies, and books, alongside a cafe and florist.

WSJ. Magazine 2017 Innovator Awards

Crafting a better future from a world in flux. This is the hallmark of WSJ. Magazine's 2017 Innovators—a group of visionary, foundation-shaking luminaries working across seven fields. This year's talents were honored at the annual Innovator Awards on November 1 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Selected by WSJ. Magazine editors, the honorees were: Reese Witherspoon (Entertainment); Raf Simons (Fashion); Diller Scofidio + Renfro (Architecture); Roman and Williams (Design); Musical.ly (Technology); Ryan Heffington (Performing Arts); Mark Bradford (Art).

For the third year in a row, MediaStorm has used its multidisciplinary approach to create films that shine a light on the legacies and innovations of each individual. These films showcase some of MediaStorm’s greatest strengths: an ability to develop a captivating story under tight constraints; combining beautiful cinematography and motion graphics to add unparalleled finesse; and working in close partnership with a client to get results.

These videos have been a critical part of WSJ’s strategy to drive it's audience to its site and to assert itself as the place of significance for the informed citizen.

In keeping with our mission to develop stories that matter, we are thrilled to play a role in recognizing the WSJ. Magazine 2017 Innovators.

The Wall St. Journal Magazine, for its seventh annual Innovator Awards, required short, fast paced, but personal, stories of innovation from each of its seven winners.

The challenge was to create a film that showed the breadth of Roman+Williams’ work in only 60 seconds, while also giving the principal designers an appropriate platform to detail what defines them as designers.

Director Samia Khan focused on the duo’s design philosophy and worked with Editor and Producer, Tim McLaughlin, to boil down the core sentiment of their 90-minute interview to about 45 seconds. With the core concepts of the piece decided, McLaughlin illustrated their philosophy through the idea of resurrection, largely because their design often focuses on the personal history of objects, and how to reanimate them for their modern customers. This idea became the conceptual underpinning of the piece.

The film premiered at the WSJ. Magazine 2017 Innovator Awards, on November 1st, and then published on the Wall St. Journal’s and MediaStorm’s websites the next day. It is a key tool for driving awareness to the magazine and the prestigious awards themselves.

With five global editions spanning 62 countries, WSJ. Magazine—which publishes 12 issues a year—is The Wall Street Journal's luxury-lifestyle publication dedicated to the power and passions of the Journal's readership.