Ancient Greek bronze helmet with horsehair crest, lit against a dark background

PURSUIT | DELOITTE

The Shield

Some clients do not need a partner so much as proof that you understand what is at stake. The proposal had to carry weight before anyone read a word.

ROLE

Creative direction, art direction, photography, illustration, print production

DELIVERED

A pursuit at this level ran six months to a year and produced a system, not a document. Websites, printed books, digital delivery, presentations, a constant stream of meeting materials, and pieces that had no precedent.

Statue of a winged woman in white holding a dark shield, overlaid with teal text blocks.
Tall text-heavy flyer with a teal circular logo and small logo near the bottom right.

The Work

The company's entire business was protection. We took that one word and kept narrowing it until it stopped being an idea and became an object: a shield, and the armor around it. From there the framework was Greek. Warriors, and Athena for strategic protection, vigilance, and the wisdom to know when to act.

The writer on the team was a classical art historian who spent her summers teaching and studying in Greece. The imagery drew on her own photographs (along with stock photography) from that work. Armor, sculpture, sun-bleached columns.

Printed off-size, clean and spare, the proposal stood apart before a single page was turned.

Every name, face and line of copy in the Deloitte work shown here has been replaced or obscured. What survives is the design, which is the part I can show you.

THE CENTERPIECE

Deloitte ad with a dark background and a close-up bronze Spartan helmet on the right.

Protection is a very old idea.

We went back to where it was first drawn.

What made it hard

The client needed to see character, not just capability. A team that understood the gravity of the work and could match it. Nothing in a standard proposal does that.

constraints

Every competitor would promise the same thing

Seriousness is easy to claim and hard to show

The standard images, a lock or a safety icon, would read as hackneyed

The document had to land before page one

Two dark decorative owl masks with weathered bronze detail, one in sharp focus on the left
Table of contents page over black geometric patterned background
Open book spread with a black-and-white statue photo on the left and a rainbow-colored pyramid chart on the right
Statue of a winged figure embracing another dark-haired figure, with French text overlays on a blue background

What lasted

The proposal received a firm-wide commendation from senior leadership.

The concept came from outside the engagement entirely, which is exactly why it fit. A picture only holds if it is the right one. Finding it is the job. That is still how I work.

This is how I work with founder-led businesses now. An in-house creative director, without the cost of hiring one.

Not meant for anyone else.

Brand, website and systems built for your business and no one else’s.