The titular Nathaniel and James of the production company, Nathaniel James, got their respective starts in the marketing and design world a long time ago – Nathaniel Howe grew up with an interest in filmmaking, recording commercials and show opens on his VCR at the age of nine, while James Sweigert started to paint and draw as a kid, expanding his skills to start his own design business in high school.

After years of preparation on their own, the duo met in Los Angeles while each was working with different agencies around town. Howe, named one of Brief magazine’s “30 under 30” in 2011, had been consistently working as a designer since he was 20 years old, moving from agency to agency, even traveling to Milan to help rebrand Sky Sports before landing a slightly more permanent gig at Buster Design. Howe was with Buster when he met Sweigert, who had made a name for himself as an executive producer at top design studios in LA, most recently at Charlie Co. and Brand New School.

According to Sweigert, they discovered that not only did they have respect for each other’s talent in the industry, but they also complemented each other’s strengths.

“James knows everybody,” said Howe, Nathaniel James’ creative director and partner. “He knows what they love and what they’re good at.”

The feeling was mutual: “Nate is such a personable guy, one of the nicest guys in the business,” said Sweigert, executive producer and partner. “I saw him grow as a talent in the business. Seldom do you see designers evolve at the speed Nate did.”

Finding that their design ideals aligned, the two began meeting in Sweigert’s loft to discuss what a possible partnership would look like. Using the book lent to them by Troika’s Chuck Carey, The Business Bible, their conversations turned to how they would do things differently from some of the agencies they had seen over the years. The book prompted them to list their core values as creatives in the field.

Howe and Sweigert boiled it down to five concepts: collaboration, world class, excellent client services, mutually beneficial relationships and a unique artistic approach.

“We want to be world class,” said Howe. “People ask us, ‘How can you possibly do something different?’ And that’s the very reason we wanted to start this company – we didn’t want to do it the same way.”

Using those five concepts, the team set up shop in Beverly Hills, branding themselves as an old school agency with a major focus on the clients.

“We wanted to link ourselves to the entertainment capital of the world. With this location comes some expectation. If you’re there, you better be world class,” said Sweigert.

The company’s name also reflects that. It uses both partners’ first names as a way to let clients know that they’re working with people, not a faceless brand, and that each of the partners personally stand behind the work they do. The logo took it one step further, taking inspiration from Savile Row shirtmakers that combines contemporary design with old school tradition.


Nathaniel James has been in business for about three years, but looking at the duo’s work in that short time, it might seem closer to 30. The amount of work this agency has created in the last three years is astounding, especially when one takes into account the caliber of its clients. That list includes ABC, HBO, National Geographic, ESPN, Discovery and PBS, with title sequences, logo work, graphics packages and rebrands.

Among their first projects was an ID for the NFL Network, and not only did the pitch work out well, they got to see their logo animation on the big screen at the Super Bowl. After that bombastic start in sports, Nathaniel James then created the main titles for ESPN Films’ award-winning 30 for 30 documentary, Hawaiian: The Legend of Eddie Aikau.

They went on to work with the Golf Channel, NASCAR and branding for world-renowned boxer Manny Pacquiao.


The creative duo continued at a breakneck pace, building their reputations on beneficial relationships and listening closely to clients in order to create a truly collaborative environment, something they both value.

“We anticipate needs. We attribute a lot of our success to that,” said Sweigert. “We do what we say we’re going to do when we say we’re going to do it.”

More recently, they worked with Spike TV to promote the current season of Ink Master. This season’s theme is Rivals, so Dave Navarro and fellow judges joined 18 tattoo artists on Nathaniel James’ set that included a promo shoot, interviews and work for digital components. Everything was done in one day, skirting around big egos and real-world rivalries that caused tension both in the promo shoot as well as in the show.

This season, Nathaniel James also worked on Fox Sports’ NBA Center Court graphics package that involved hundreds of deliverables for the sports network. The nationwide campaign involved matching up two teams for each of 22 regional Fox Sports channels, ending up with a toolkit that had to adapt to any number of possible teams, basketball stars and regions across the country.

Howe points to this project as an example of what both men love about working with people – being able to provide them with exactly what they need with an attention to detail that is often unexpected, or as Sweigert describes it, “over-delivering” in all aspects of the creative, from pitch to completion.

Next up for Nathaniel James is a partnership with Edge Theory on a project that engages a group they’re calling “pre-viewers” on a social media marketing platform. With what they have termed a “find engine,” the two companies have worked together for the past several months on a way to enhance awareness of entertainments brands, finding the people who would watch a certain program, for example, if they only knew about it (or knew more about it). Brands can target these audiences with Edge Theory’s technology by distributing brand-specific messaging across social sites, then measuring their effectiveness among “pre-viewers” and reporting those statistics back.

Among other projects coming up for the design studio are a network rebrand, a project for the Hollywood Film Awards and a rebrand for Los Angeles Film School.

And though that seems like a lot on the small studio’s plate, Howe says that’s precisely the plan. “We just got started and we have so much farther to go.”

“I always jokingly tell people, my mother has no idea what I do for a living. She thinks I’m a fireman,” said Sweigert. “I was able to explain to her, ‘Mom, we make beautiful pictures that move.’ I love what I do and I love everyone I do it with. Very few people can say that.”

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