At Sylvia Harris LLC, which she established in 1994 after leaving Two Twelve, she shifted her focus to design planning and strategy. In the process, she guided some of the nation’s largest hospitals, universities and civic agencies through systems planning, policy development and innovation management. As creative director for the United States Census Bureau, Census 2000, she was tasked with encouraging more Americans—including those who had been previously under-represented—to participate. Distributed to 80 million households, the 2000 Census presented an opportunity to study how a redesigned form might boost participation as well as public awareness of the Census brand.

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Harris was a woman of great energy, passion and intelligence. She nurtured these qualities by reaching out beyond the walls of her studio. She had a remarkable ability to draw smart, talented young people into her network, making them collaborators and friends. And she generously gave back to the design community that she so vibrantly inhabited for more than three decades, mentoring students as a faculty member of Yale’s graphic design program and as a teacher at the School of Visual Arts, Cooper Union and Purchase College. She also served on the U.S. Postal Service’s Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee.

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As a designer and a woman, Sylvia Harris always wanted to do the right thing, the smart thing, the thing that would make the biggest difference to the most people. She was the model citizen—a Citizen Designer.