A North Vancouver resident is part of a duo that has won international recognition for their speedy but thoughtful desgin work.
Jesse Shaw, who is based in North Vancouver, and Zoë Boudreau, who lives in Kelowna, took gold at the Young Lions Design Competition in the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.
The pair first competed together in the design category of the Canadian Young Lions Competitions in March.
For the competition, teams were tasked with designing a brand identity for a ‘Bike for Brain Health’ event in Toronto.
“We were given 24 hours to rebrand what that looks like, come up with a logo, build an entire identity system around this, which is pretty standard for what we do in our day-to-day,” Shaw said. “We worked from six a.m. to one in the morning, which was definitely intense.”
Shaw and Boudreau’s final product outlined an idea for a bike that shifts depending on its environment to reflect on the disorientation that dementia causes.
“We were trying to represent how the experience of dementia is super varied, it doesn’t take a singular shape for a lot of people, so we were trying to explore that visually,” said Shaw. “The idea was to build something that people get excited about, and feel represented by.”
In April, the pair found out that their design had gotten shortlisted, and they were invited to travel to Toronto to pitch their design. A few weeks later, Shaw and Boudreau found out that they had won gold for the design category, and were invited to continue competing in the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity in June.
Once in Cannes, Shaw and Boudreau were given their second design challenge: come up with an identity for an exhibition in the Museum of Art and Photography in Bengaluru, India about the history of Indian comic books. The designers were told they had 24 hours to produce an image that challenges the notion that comics are a Western, child-centric medium.
“Both Zoë’s and my approach to design and creativity is pretty light and playful, and between us, there’s a fair bit of trust,” said Shaw. “When we get these projects, we get to have fun, and our design personalities come out.”
The pair spent hours brainstorming, sketching potential ideas and doing anthropological research to ensure that their work was both fresh and representative of the exhibition.
Their hours and hours of work paid off. Shaw and Boudreau’s piece was awarded with gold, winning the Young Lions Design Competition in the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.
Shaw said he believes the advantage he and Boudreau had was that, unlike other Canadian teams, the pair had a variety in their specialties. Boudreau is a graphic designer, and Shaw is a motion graphics designer.
“We’re approaching problems in two different senses, and we’re not both thinking the same way, which I think it pretty valuable,” Shaw said.
Living on the North Shore didn’t hurt either, he added.
“It was super cool to represent B.C. and North Vancouver,” said Shaw. “I really like going for walks when I’m brainstorming, because I spend so much time sitting behind the computer in my day-to-day, but living somewhere that’s so beautiful and getting out to appreciate it is super integral to coming up with good ideas and staying focused in the long run.”
Zain Alragheb is a student intern reporting for the North Shore News. She can be reached at [email protected].
