Senior creative direction for organizations that need the judgment, not the headcount.
The situation this is for
You have a creative or experiential program that matters — a launch, an exhibit, an innovation center, a brand platform with a technology story at the center of it — and no senior creative leader in the seat. Maybe the last one left. Maybe the work is being handled by agencies who are executing against briefs nobody senior is writing. Maybe the team is good but drifting without a standard to build toward.
The usual options are to run a months-long search for a full-time hire, or to hand the whole thing to an agency and hope. There’s a third path: put an experienced creative director in the seat for as long as you actually need one.
What I do in the role
Write the briefs. Most creative problems are brief problems. I run discovery with your stakeholders and subject-matter experts, find what the work is actually trying to say, and write the brief that makes it buildable.
Hold the agencies accountable. I sit on your side of the table. I know what a realistic timeline looks like, what a production estimate should contain, and the difference between “that’s hard” and “that’s not possible.” Vendors tend to sharpen up when the client can read the work.
Set and hold the creative standard. Direction, feedback, and a bar for the team to build toward — for in-house designers, external partners, or both.
Make complex things tangible. My specialty is technology brands and technical subject matter: taking something abstract or genuinely complicated and finding the concept that makes an audience care. I was trained in both studio art and computer science and have led projects in engineering industry domains, so with technical material I’m working as part of the audience rather than translating for it.
Build the capability, not just the campaign. Where it’s useful, I leave behind process: discovery formats, brief templates, production workflow, vendor standards — so the function keeps working after I’m gone.
Proof
Deloitte. Beginning in 2018 I led concept and design for a series of large-scale interactive experiences. In the course of that work I effectively launched the interactive division of what had been primarily a projection-mapping and production company — establishing process from statements of work through concept, design, production, and deployment. My contributions to proposals and pitch presentations generated significant new business for the company. That engagement is the clearest example of what this model produces: not a campaign, a capability.
Brocade. As Creative Director I conceived, designed, and built “The Infinite Game” end to end — reframing complex software-defined networking messaging as an interactive narrative built on game theory, for a trade-show audience worn down by bullet points. It won the account and ran as a three-show series across the US and Europe.
Booz Allen Hamilton. Led production of immersive visual experiences for The Helix, their center for innovation in Washington, DC — coordinating animation, sound design, voice, and post teams against complex technology and strategy narratives, with client stakeholders and subject-matter experts.
Cummins. Directed the interactive exhibit and sales tool across IA, UX, UI, copywriting, information graphics, and motion graphics, as main client contact and primary contributor to proposals and SOWs. The work generated three new major engagements the following year.
Also: Audi (LA Auto Show), Ericsson (Mobile World Congress), Shell (Deepwater VR, Bronze Telly Award), Coachella with Poetic Kinetics, and installations with Chris Cunningham at Audi City London.
Engagement shapes
Interim Creative Director — full seat, defined window. Typically three to nine months, covering a gap while a permanent search runs, an extended absence, or a relaunch that needs senior direction throughout. I attend the standups and own day-to-day creative direction.
Fractional Creative Director — ongoing, part-time. Senior creative oversight on a permanent basis without a permanent seat. Suits organizations whose creative volume doesn’t justify a full-time executive but whose creative stakes do.
Project creative direction — a single program with a beginning and an end: an exhibit, an installation, an event, a launch.
Advisory — the lightest version. Agency selection, brief review, feasibility and scope assessment, creative QA at milestones. Useful when you have capable execution and need a second senior read.
About
I’m a creative director, creative technologist, and executive producer based in Los Angeles. Trained in studio art and computer science, with a working background in music. My work spans interactive installations, spatial environments, innovation centers, and the digital experiences around them — from the discovery session through on-site deployment.
I still design and build. Not on your team’s behalf, but it means I can promise something genuinely new without guessing whether it can be delivered.
Engagements contract through my practice, Giedion/Kircher: when a program needs a production team rather than a just director in the seat.
Let’s talk. pgj@peterjohnson.net · 323.854.6618