Brand Storytelling Through Events: What 23 Layers Brings to Corporate Activations in NYC

There is a version of corporate event planning that functions like facilities management — rooms booked, catering arranged, slides loaded, attendees checked in. It is competent and forgettable. And then there is the version that treats an event as a live extension of a brand’s identity, where every spatial decision, every visual cue, every moment of transition between activities carries deliberate meaning. That second version is what 23 Layers was built to deliver.

The New York-based production and design agency, founded by Jessica Boskoff in 2011, has consistently framed its work in terms of narrative rather than logistics. “We look at each event as an opportunity for compelling storytelling and design innovation,” Boskoff has said. For corporate clients, that distinction matters more than it might initially appear.

Events occupy a specific and increasingly valuable space in the broader marketing mix. Unlike digital advertising, which reaches audiences across a screen, events put people in physical environments that can be wholly designed to communicate a brand’s values, culture, and positioning. Done well, they create shared experiences that attendees carry with them well after the event has ended. Done poorly, they become expensive exercises in logistics that generate little lasting impression.

For companies seeking corporate event planners in New York who can execute the first scenario rather than the second, the agency’s approach starts well before any design work begins. 23 Layers spends the early part of every client engagement understanding the company’s brand identity — what it stands for, how it wants to be perceived, what its culture feels like from the inside — before translating any of that into physical or experiential design. The sequence is deliberate: clarity of brand first, design second.

That methodology has made 23 Layers a preferred partner for brands operating in industries where perception matters acutely. Clients, including Glossier, whose brand identity is inseparable from the aesthetics of its physical environments, and Spotify, whose cultural resonance extends well beyond its core product, are not simply looking for event companies in NYC to manage logistics. They are looking for firms that understand how brand and experience intersect.

The integration of producers and designers within a single team — a structural choice Boskoff has maintained since the agency’s founding — allows 23 Layers to move between concept and execution without the handoff friction that can dilute creative vision in agencies where those functions are separated. A concept developed by the design team does not then need to be translated, reinterpreted, or scaled back by a separate production team working from a brief. The same people who develop the vision carry it through to the event floor.

That structure has produced work that has been recognized across the events industry. The Attentive Mobile Thread Conference, produced by 23 Layers in a 30,000-square-foot building, won BizBash’s award for Best Corporate Event Concept. The project involved transforming the entire building into a designed environment — a project type that requires design and production to operate as a single function, not two departments in sequence.

The agency has also extended its thinking about events as brand tools into a broader educational context. Through The Assembly Workshop, a platform created by Boskoff for event planners by event planners, the firm has moved into mentorship and professional development for the next generation of producers and designers. It is a natural extension of an agency that has always treated the craft of event-making as a discipline worthy of serious investment.

For corporate clients evaluating their options among corporate event planner New York choices, the question of what differentiates one firm from another often comes down to this: does the agency treat the event as a production problem, or as a communication opportunity? 23 Layers has spent more than a decade answering that question clearly.

As one of the most consistently recognized event companies in NYC, the agency’s work across client categories — tech, beauty, media, retail — demonstrates that the brand storytelling approach transfers across industries. The medium is the same; the message changes. And according to the clients who return to 23 Layers year after year, the agency knows the difference.