Sid Lee Adds New Creative Talent

The New York office of global creative agency Sid Lee has added four key creatives to its full-time staff, effective immediately.  The new hires are Design Director Verena Michelitsch, Co-Creative Director Cecilia Azcarate, Senior Creative Andre Gidoin and Copywriter Dana Tiel.

Verena was most recently Senior Designer for boutique design agency RoAndCo since January of 2013.  She moved to New York in 2011 and began freelancing for Sagmeister & Walsh and Pentagram Design, handling a variety of branding, illustration and art direction projects over the years.  She first established herself as an art director as a founding member of the Graz, Austria-based En Garde design studio, and is the recipient of several Cannes Young Lion Awards in Austria and a Red Dot "Best of the Best" Communications Design Award.

"I was attracted by the highly interdisciplinary work of Sid Lee – no project is like the other," she explained. "Also, they have a very interesting range of clients, a high appreciation for design, the people are very friendly and the office environment is amazing."

Cecilia joins Sid Lee from her most recent position as Associate Creative Director for M&C Saatchi.  Among her many career honors to-date are multiple Webby Awards, D&AD, Eurobest, Epica, FWA Site of the Day and Mobile of the Day Awards, and her original artworks are part of the permanent collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and NYC's Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum.  Born in Spain, she has also held Art Director positions with NYC-based agency Johannes Leonardo, and Happiness Brussels and Anouk & Company in Belgium.

"I noticed right away that the creatives at Sid Lee acknowledge how fast our industry is changing, how creativity can now be found anywhere, and how we can be inspired and collaborate with very unexpected people," she observed. "Applying all of this to iconic brands such as Absolut or Facebook is especially of interest to me.  Also, the attention to craftsmanship and the importance given to design here is quite unique in the advertising world."

Andre Gidoin landed with Leo Burnett in New York early in 2013, holding the position of Senior Art Director until leaving to join Sid Lee.  Prior to that, he was an Interactive Art Director for Leo Burnett in Milan since 2009.  Of French-Norwegian descent and a 2009 graduate of Oslo's Westerdals School of Communication, Andre has already earned top honors at most major awards shows for creative communication... and he is ranked among the top 16 young creatives in the world by the Young Guns for the past two years straight.

"Sid Lee is positioned unlike any other advertising agency in the world, being able to offer our clients work that has real value for them and their consumers," he said. "I'm incredibly excited about joining the team and helping grow brands and create unique pieces of work."

Dana Tiel joins Sid Lee from Grey New York, where she has held the position of Copywriter since joining the firm in 2012.  Previously, she was a Copywriter for SapientNitro.  A 2011 graduate of New York's School of Visual Arts, Dana has earned a Cannes Young Lion Award, multiple One Show awards, Clio, International Andy and ADC Young Guns Awards, and multiple Graphis New Talent awards.

Asked what attracted her to Sid Lee, Dana first pointed to the more intimate work setting before continuing: "I'm also really happy to be working on Facebook, mostly because it's a brand that my parents have heard of."