For almost 15 years, James has been one of France’s most sought after English-language writers for agencies and brands wanting to communicate on the world stage.

He has created beloved campaigns for such international brands as Gillette, M&Ms, Ubisoft, Canderel (that’s Equal here in Australia), Autan (that’s Aerogard here), LVMH, L’Oreal, Peugeot and many more. His work has been recognised by D&AD, Cannes, One Show, LIA, Effies and more.

His M&Ms Christmas commercial is still beloved part of the Christmas tradition in markets around the world and his “Feels Good to Be You” global brand platform and slogan for 7UP is still in use today, 10 years after he created it.

As the Creative Director for International Brands at BBDO Paris, he focused on building relationships of trust with his clients that encouraged them to grow through innovative and creative ideas. And, within the agency, he took pride in nurturing the talents of his creatives, expanding their skill-sets to help them give their best ideas the best chance, and creating an environment that allowed a better and braver creative department to emerge.

James is renowned for creating international campaigns and platforms that connect to consumers across multiple countries, cultures, contexts and constraints. His work varies from the quirky, to the heart-warming, to the exciting and inspirational - but always with an insight that links the brand to the audience in a novel and memorable way.

Outside of the agency life, James also writes and performs poetry for fun. Historically he did this at various Open Mic nights around Paris but the commute from Australia makes that harder these days. The literary group he helped found, Bodies of Work Paris, continues to run Open mic nights, writing workshops and generally flourish without him in bars and alleys around Paris (a fact that he is pleased about but also slightly miffed about). James also enjoys woodworking and builds his own furniture as part of a complicated and convoluted experiment in self-harm involving chisels.

James is going to stop writing about himself in the third person now, before he becomes one of those people who do it in conversation.

If you’d like to find out if he stopped in time, drop him a line to arrange a chat…