The New York Times announces promotions for Heather Casey and Christy Harmon

Heather Casey (Photo credit: Christopher Thomas Smith)

I’m delighted to announce the promotion of two of our outstanding photo editors, Heather Casey and Christy Harmon, to senior photo editors.

Anyone who works with Heather notices the care she takes with every story she is a part of. She works tirelessly to elevate the visual report on National, directing breaking news coverage and driving regular and ambitious visual enterprise aligned with the desk’s editorial goals. Her creative ideas, collaborative approach, and support and guidance for journalists in the field make her invaluable to National’s report and to the Photo department.

In this expanded role, Heather will work closely with Jia Lynn Yang and Meghan Louttit to help National further develop its approach to visual journalism. She will focus on steering multimedia coverage and mobile-first approaches, and she will be instrumental in deepening our staff and contributing photojournalists’ video practice. She will also develop her leadership skills mentoring the team of photo editors on the desk. Heather “cares deeply about our coverage, and about the photographers and reporters that she works with. I greatly appreciate her honesty, empathy and spirit,” said Meghan.

Heather joined The Times in 2016, and has contributed to a range of desks, including Sports, Metro, Politics and International. Since 2020, she has been an editor on the National desk. Before The Times, she helped produce an Emmy-winning documentary series at Time, capturing an astronaut’s yearlong mission aboard the International Space Station.

Christy Harmon

Christy has produced exemplary work as a photo editor on the Styles desk. Since 2023, Christy has partnered with the staff photographer Simbarashe Cha to develop and define our street style coverage and Simbarashe’s column, Style Outside, using a mix of photography and video. Continuing to evolve our street style coverage, Christy and Simbarashe developed the Look of the Week column, which launched in January.

Going forward Christy will take on expanded responsibilities for the Styles desk’s visual report, working with the desk leadership — Stella Bugbee, Minju Pak — as well as members of the News Design team to further develop the desk’s approach to visual formats and its overall visual identity. She will take a lead in integrating more video into the Styles report and prioritizing a mobile-first approach for all platforms on which readers engage with our journalism. And she will build on the Styles desk’s healthy embrace of visual storytelling and collaboration.

“Christy always manages to bring an extra layer of polish to everything she works on. She runs toward the most challenging stories with gusto, elevating concepts and pushing past run-of-the-mill solutions. Styles wouldn’t look nearly as good without her,” said Stella.

Christy has worked on 16 desks across the newsroom since joining The Times in 2015. Before joining Styles in 2022, she worked on Culture, overseeing art and TV coverage. She was also part of the team that produced At Home, a special print section providing much-needed advice, activities and service to readers sheltering in place during the pandemic. Prior to The Times, Christy worked at various music, fashion and lifestyle publications.

Please join us in congratulating Christy and Heather on these well-deserved promotions.