Meet the Judges

Katherine Darnstadt is the founder and principal architect of Latent Design, a progressive architecture, urbanism, and interiors firm leveraging civic innovation and social impact to design more equitable spaces and systems. Since founding her practice in 2010, Katherine and her firm have been published, exhibited, and featured widely, most notably at the International Venice Architecture Biennale, Core 77 Design Awards, Architizer A+ Awards, Chicago Ideas Week, NPR, American Institute of Architects Young Architects Honor Award winner, and Crain’s Chicago 40 Under 40. She currently teaches at Northwestern University.

Siggi Hilmarsson moved to the US from Iceland to attend Columbia Business School. Adjusting to the American diet, he found American yogurt excessively sweet, so he started making his own in his New York City apartment based on Icelandic traditions and using less sugar. A year later he started selling his yogurts at an outdoor farmers market in downtown Manhattan. Today, siggi’s yogurt is available in 25,000 outlets around the US including major grocers such as Target, Whole Foods, Wegmans and Kroger. In 2016 Starbucks launched siggi’s yogurt into 7,000 of their stores nationwide. Siggi’s passion for healthy eating and decreasing sugar in our diets has gotten him recognized by Food & Wine Magazine’s 40 Under 40, Goldman Sachs 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs and Paper Magazine’s cheeky Beautiful People issue.

Sam Kass is a food entrepreneur and former White House Chef and Senior Policy Advisor for Nutrition. He is the founder of TROVE and a partner in Acre Venture Partners. During his White House tenure, Sam took on several additional roles including Executive Director of First Lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” campaign and Senior White House Policy Advisor for Nutrition. Sam is the first person in the history of the White House to have a position in the Executive Office of the President and the Residence. In 2011, Fast Company named Sam to their list of 100 Most Creative People, and in 2012, Sam helped create the American Chef Corps, which is dedicated to promoting diplomacy through culinary initiatives.

Jason Mayden is a designer and entrepreneur-in-residence at Accel Partners, assisting with the development of Accel’s brand position among the global community of entrepreneurs while working with portfolio companies on deepening and extending their knowledge and ability to create cultures of curiosity. He is also CEO and founder of Super Heroic, a business focused on providing quality play-performance footwear, apparel, and technology for elementary school aged children. During his 13+ year career at Nike, he served as Senior Global Design Director and Global Director of Innovation for Nike Digital Sport, Jason led and contributed to the creation of innovative sport performance products for athletes and cultural icons such as Carmelo Anthony, Chris Paul, Russell Westbrook, Derek Jeter, and Michael Jordan. Jason is a d.Fellow and Media Design Lecturer at the Stanford Hasso Plattner School of Design; a lecturer at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, where he holds a Master’s in General Management and Social Innovation; a regular columnist for Hypebeast Magazine and hypebeast.com; an advisory board member to his alma mater the College for Creative Studies; and an advisor of Slyce, a company created by Bryant Barr and Stephen Curry.

Martha Stewart is an Emmy Award-winning television show host, entrepreneur, bestselling author of 88 books, and America’s most trusted lifestyle expert and teacher. Millions of people rely on Martha Stewart for “how-to” information on all aspects of everyday living—cooking, entertaining, gardening, home renovating, collecting, organizing, crafting, holidays, healthy living, and pets. The Martha Stewart brand reaches over 100 million consumers across all media and merchandising platforms each month. A pioneer in bringing high-quality products to mass market, Martha’s branded products can now be found in over 70 million households and thousands of retail locations. Martha developed a passion for cooking, gardening, and homekeeping at an early age, and went on to earn a bachelor’s degree in history and architectural history at Barnard College. She then became a stockbroker on Wall Street, where she gained her early business training. Martha has been awarded numerous honors and distinctions from the worlds of business, education, media, culinary arts, animal welfare, and retail, including being named one of the “50 Most Powerful Women” by Fortune magazine 5 times; inclusion in TIME magazine’s annual “TIME 100” list in 2005; 18 Daytime Emmy Awards; and 5 James Beard Foundation Awards.

Todd Waterbury is Target’s Chief Creative Officer. In his role, Todd establishes the creative direction of Target’s marketing efforts, leading an internal team of art directors, designers, developers, writers and producers, as well as its external agency and design partners, who, together, craft creative content for the Target brand. Todd has extensive experience in creating strategic, highly integrated marketing and design work for a broad roster of clients. He joined Target in January 2013 from the consulting company he established, during which time he worked with national and international clients including Uniqlo and Twitter. Prior to that, Todd served as co-executive creative director at Wieden+Kennedy New York, an agency where he oversaw campaigns for brands ranging from Nike to Delta Airlines. Todd’s work has received numerous design and advertising awards, and is included in the permanent collections of the Guggenheim and the Museum of Modern Art. Todd is also proud to serve on the board of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

Alice Waters is a chef, author, food activist, and the founder and owner of Chez Panisse Restaurant in Berkeley, California. She has been a champion of local sustainable agriculture for over four decades. In 1995 she founded the Edible Schoolyard Project, which advocates for a free school lunch for all children and a sustainable food curriculum in every public school. She has been Vice President of Slow Food International since 2002. She conceived and helped create the Yale Sustainable Food Project in 2003, and the Rome Sustainable Food Project at the American Academy in Rome in 2007. Her honors include election as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2007; the Harvard Medical School’s Global Environmental Citizen Award, which she shared with Kofi Annan in 2008; and her induction into the French Legion of Honor in 2010. In 2015 she was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Obama, proving that eating is a political act, and that the table is a powerful means to social justice and positive change. Alice is the author of fifteen books, including New York Times bestsellers The Art of Simple Food I & II, and The Edible Schoolyard: A Universal Idea.