Secret Lair

Bringing Magic: The Gathering into new visual worlds with every release. We created a scalable design system that kept pace with each drop while making every one feel completely unique.

Thinkingbox

Social

2025

Project Description

Project Description

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I had the opportunity to help bring the 2026 Secret Lair Drops to life, creating bold visual identities and experiences that celebrate the worlds and collaborations of Magic: The Gathering. This was a collaborative effort across designers, motion artists, producers, and creatives across Thinkingbox and Wizards of the Coast to bring these to life.

One Playbook to Rule All the Worlds.

Our team of strategists, creatives, and producers worked together to develop a systematic approach so that every drop followed a three-phase content flywheel: educate before launch, eventize on the drop day, and engage after the release. With this approach, all assets—from motion and video to CRM and activation—were tailored to capture a specific release but also to frame it for a mass audience.

Back to School Superdrop

This Superdrop spanned four Magic IPs and four partner collaborations—from pastel ponies to surreal eye art to cult simulation worlds; we used the back-to-school theme to connect otherwise unrelated drops. The range distributed attention, and each drop pulled in its own audience, aesthetic, and conversation.

We showed the overlap with collisions of taste and personality that happen when the community converges. This wasn’t about getting everyone to want the same thing; it was about capturing the electricity of everyone being there at the same time.

Festival in a Box - MagicCon 2026 Las Vegas

When Secret Lair created FIAB = Festival in a Box: a limited-edition Magic product released around each MagicCon, we treated it like a performance—staging it as the Rakdos show inside the wider FIAB and making Secret Lair feel like the headline act, not a bonus feature.

When Secret Lair created FIAB = Festival in a Box: a limited-edition Magic product released around each MagicCon, we treated it like a performance—staging it as the Rakdos show inside the wider FIAB and making Secret Lair feel like the headline act, not a bonus feature.

Cats are the Best Superdrop

Who doesn't love cats? Fans love to reimagine and reinterpret the everyday, so we made our favorite feline the main character. The Superdrop could have stayed at "Cats," but we pushed it a step further by showcasing the artists front and centre. The cards became a mini gallery of cat interpretations, giving the community something to debate, share, and obsess over.

Who doesn't love cats? Fans love to reimagine and reinterpret the everyday, so we made our favorite feline the main character. The Superdrop could have stayed at "Cats," but we pushed it a step further by showcasing the artists front and centre. The cards became a mini gallery of cat interpretations, giving the community something to debate, share, and obsess over.

Mood Swings

A brand new card game from the mind behind the color pie. Mark Rosewater spent years shaping how Magic sees the world. Mood Swings came from that same foundation, building on the same philosophy and way of thinking but expressed in a simpler, faster format.

By combining a content system with a drop-specific creative, we turned every release into a moment that was worth paying attention to.

A brand new card game from the mind behind the color pie. Mark Rosewater spent years shaping how Magic sees the world. Mood Swings came from that same foundation, building on the same philosophy and way of thinking but expressed in a simpler, faster format.

By combining a content system with a drop-specific creative, we turned every release into a moment that was worth paying attention to.

Credits

Credits

Role: Designer

Designers: Nicky Dolan, Liza Borissova, Helen Gu, Jarom Bradshaw

Group Creative Director: Jessica Luch
Creative Director: Kiel Cummings

Agency: Thinkingbox / The Heist

Client: Magic the Gathering

Art Director: Anthony Palermo, Brian Du, Nick Pons
Motion Designers: Telli Narcizo, Amin Kasraian, Miguel Sarroca
Copywriter: Sadie Graham, Justin Lam

Strategy: Tamiya Kabatoff, Arthur Fabbro

Producer: Crystal Lau

Executive Producer : Anh Dinh

Motion Designer: Miquel Reina, Miguel Sarroca

Group Account Director : Daniel Midgley

Director of Production: Satoru Inoue

Senior Digital Producer: Rebecca Kenward

Developers: Luke Jensen, Saugat Malla, Ken Taylor