Creative Lives

For our latest podcast, we chat to Nafisa Bakkar, the CEO and co-founder behind Amaliah.com, a media platform amplifying the voices of muslim women. She talks to us about unexpectedly finding her way to a creative role after studying natural sciences, how she tackles imposter syndrome and her inspiring advice for anyone who hasn’t yet nailed exactly what they want to do.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, Colophon Foundry, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

On the podcast this week, we meet strategic account director and comedian, Adam Larter. After studying politics and creative writing at Kingston University, Adam tells us how he found himself in the world of advertising after landing a spot on a graduate scheme at Ogilvy, and how he eventually came to work in strategy.

Alongside his full-time role at London-based agency, Studio Black Tomato, Adam is also the founder of comedy collective the Weirdos Comedy Club. Listen in as he talks about balancing work in both advertising and comedy, and the benefits of having outside interests.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Marianne Hanoun and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, Colophon Foundry, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

On the podcast this week, we hear from New York-based data journalist and illustrator, Mona Chalabi. With an inimitable visual style that strays far from cold and clinical graphs and charts, Mona has, in her own words, set out to “take the numb out of numbers.” We talked to her about how she found her way to journalism, what she prefers about working in the States and how she came to drawing through a particularly unhappy period at work.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, Colophon Foundry, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

On the podcast this week, we meet Wieden+Kennedy planner and strategist, Ayo Fagbemi. Graduating with a BA in politics and international relations, Ayo found his way to advertising after being handpicked to join W+K’s creative incubator program, The Kennedy’s last year.

Spending four months learning the ropes, he was later offered an internship and hired as a full-time creative strategist earlier this year. He talks about pushing brands to create positive change, how his interest in politics influences his approach to work; and why it can be beneficial to replenish commercial work with passion projects.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Marianne Hanoun and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

This week we get a thorough insight into the world of brand strategy, with our guest James Groves. Originally trained in graphic design, James has now earned over 15 years experience in the industry. In that time he’s worked both in-house and independently, in roles that have ranged from creative and art director to marketing manager and strategy consultant. He now runs his own brand strategy company, Alt, which works with clients like Paypal, font specialists Monotype and co-working space Uncommon.

We hear the journey that took James from studying graphic design at the University of Lincoln, to identifying an interest in strategy.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

Our guest this week is Dan Sandison, editor-in-chief of Mundial magazine. Launched in 2014 as an alternative to the laddy football publications of the time, Mundial is a quarterly magazine championing the uplifting side of football culture. It attracts around 120,000 readers annually and is now stocked in both WH Smith and Barnes & Noble, as well as independent stores across the world.

Dan tells us all about how he went from writing for free between factory work, to running a fully fledged creative studio and magazine with a team of eight people.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress in conjunction with ModMag London. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

This week’s guest is New York-based writer and editor Deidre Dyer, whose inspiring journey has seen her go from retail work, to serving as style editor at The Fader magazine, to overseeing marketing for a cannabis start-up. But more recently, Deidre was made executive editor of ‘No Man’s Land’, which is a biannual print magazine founded by American company The Wing.

We hear how Deidre earned a degree in Media Studies, but it was only at the age of 25 that she embarked on a related. She describes the highs lows and lessons learned through her path so far.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress in conjunction with ModMag London. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

On the podcast this week, we chat to Stefanie Sword-Williams, an account director at media company and agency TCO London. Alongside her day job, Stefanie also runs the unapologetically titled F*ck Being Humble, an events series and self-promotion platform, founded earlier this year. Since graduating with a degree in fashion communication, she has worked her way around various roles in advertising between Nottingham, Manchester and now London. She tells us about her route into agency work, what prompted her to start her own initiative, and how the role of an account manager varies across different companies.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

In this week’s podcast we get to know Rod Stanley – the former editor of Dazed & Confused, now working from New York as a writer, director and editor of Good Trouble, a publication combining creativity and protest.

This is the first in our series of conversations recorded at the recent ModMag London, a one-day editorial conference created by magazine store and editorial-design resource MagCulture. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing these conversations with speakers from the day, as they discuss their start in the world of editorial, thoughts on what makes for a great magazine, and advice for others wanting to get into the same area of work.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress in conjunction with ModMag London. It was presented by Indi Davies and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.

Our guest on the podcast this week is Blue State Digital's executive creative director, Matt Ipcar. Sharing pivotal moments and highlights from his career so far, he tells us about studying architecture and his first jobs – designing automotive print ads, to working as a design lead on both Obama campaigns. Originally from New York, we met with Matt after he took to the stage at Design Manchester to find out more about his role, creating work that positively impacts the world – and the email he once sent to Steve Jobs.

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This episode of Creative Lives was brought to you by Lecture in Progress. It was presented by Marianne Hanoun and the editor was Ivor Manly.

Lecture in Progress is made possible with the support of a number of brand partners – they include ustwo, Google, Sky Creative Agency, G.F Smith and The Paul Smith Foundation.