A Diamond is Forever.

Frances Gerety wrote this iconic signature line for De Beers in 1947 while she was a copywriter at N.W. Ayer. Nearly seventy years later, the line is still in use and Advertising Age named it the Slogan of the Century in 1999.

When Frances first presented the line to her agency colleagues, no one thought it was anything special. In her words, “Nobody jumped.” It was argued that the line didn’t really mean anything and was even grammatically incorrect.

Fortunately, it went before the client who immediately recognized its value. The rest, as they say, is history.

Too often, great ideas are squashed by committee before ever getting a chance to fly. Instead of evaluating creative against data and demographics and dry strategy briefs, sometimes you just need to step back and ask, “How does it make me feel?”

Empathy and emotion are at the core of everything I do. I think of myself as a "method writer," immersing in the mindset of the target audience to create concepts and copy that resonate and ring true.

The goal here was to select projects that showed my range and ability across different mediums, different industries and voices.

I'm passionate about what I do and love creating work that is fresh, making connections between things where there hadn't been before. Brainstorming, for me, doesn't stop at the office. I think about concepts, headlines and strategies in the shower, supermarket, before falling asleep, everywhere. It often makes it difficult to fill out timesheets.

Please enjoy this sampling of my work. I welcome any feedback or comments.