Large Agencies
The structural difference between a small studio and a large agency shapes everything who makes decisions how fast ideas move and what kind of work gets made.
Small studios tend to operate with flat hierarchies and general roles. The founder often leads creative directly everyone touches the work and the output tends to have a singular distinctive voice. Large agencies by contrast, have separate strategy and production teams with multiple layers of approval and specialists who own parts of the process.
Wieden+Kennedy ‘Nike’ Their long-standing relationship with Nike demonstrates the agency model at its strongest. Dedicated account teams, strategists, art directors and copywriters collaborate on campaigns of a scale no small studio could resource. The “Just Do It” platform has been sustained across decades through this structure. (Follow on from Assignment 1)
In-house teams vs. independent studios
One of the most significant shifts in the last decade has been brands building serious in house creative teams not just to cut costs, but to own their creative output more completely.
Spotify Wrapped Spotify’s internal creative team produces Wrapped entirely in-house a campaign that has become a global cultural moment year after year. The depth of brand familiarity and data access only an internal team can have is central to why it works. No external agency could have that intimacy with the product.
Roles and responsibilities within teams
The creative director owns the overall vision and idea sets the conceptual frame and holds creative standards across a project. The art director translates that concept into a visuals, photography typography, layout, colours and typically works in close partnership with at the rest of the team . The designer executes the art direction, responsible primarily for craft and producing finished assets. In many agencies the collaboration is the fundamental creative unit the relationship between image and language is where most ideas actually live. The strategist defines the brief and the insight that drives the work bridging business objectives and creative output. In smaller studios this role is often absorbed by the Creative Director or the designer themselves.
Art direction vs. creative direction
Creative direction is about the idea the territory, the tone, the concept. Art direction is about how that idea is made visual every choice of colours, type, image, space, and composition.In a small studio, one person often holds both roles simultaneously.
Reflection of my experience
Not every working relationship starts well. When I first joined the project the marketing team were cautious they didn’t know me and that unfamiliarity created distance. I simply hadn’t earned their trust yet. So I stopped waiting for it to be offered and started building it. I created assets based on their existing work and sent them over for review without being asked. No agenda just a signal that I was genuinely there to collaborate. It worked. Once they saw the effort the relationship opened up entirely. What followed was exactly the kind of back and forth described earlier in this post constant exchange, marketing insight feeding directly into design decisions each iteration better than the last. The client noticed the feedback was strong and it was strong because the work was informed.
But watching my peers on the design side told a different story. Several of them never got to that place with their teams the friction stayed and had different experiences. The lesson isn’t that collaboration is always easy It’s that it’s always necessary you find a way to make it work because the quality of the outcome depends on it.
Reference
Behance – In hause right for you (2025) – https://www.behance.net/resources/articles/in-house [Accessed 30/04/26]
Abstract – Big agency Vs small agency – does size still matter? (2026) – https://weareabstrakt.com/insights/big-agency-vs-small-agency-does-size-still-matter [Accessed 30/04/26]
Indeed – Art Director vs Creative Director (2025) https://uk.indeed.com/career-advice/finding-a-job/art-director-vs-creative-director [Accessed 30/04/26]
W+K – Wieden + Kennedy (2026) https://www.wk.com [Accessed 30/04/26]
Wieden + Kennedy Wikipedia (2026) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wieden%2BKennedy [Accessed 30/04/26]
Just do it – Just do it wikipedia (2026) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_Do_It [Accessed 30/04/26]
W+K – Nike Dream Crazy (2018) https://www.wk.com/work/nike-dream-crazy/ [Accessed 30/04/26]
Image Reference
4kWallpaper – Just do it (2020) https://4kwallpapers.com/black-dark/just-do-it-8k-black-11721.html [Accessed 28/02/26]
W+K – Nike Dream Crazy (2018) https://www.wk.com/work/nike-dream-crazy/ [Accessed 28/02/26]
Spotify – Spotify Wrapped 2025 (2025) – https://www.figma.com/community/file/1580280957746609483 [Accessed 28/02/26]
Medium – Why is Spotify Wrapped so popular? (2024) – https://uxdesign.cc/why-is-spotify-wrapped-so-popular-5c503e79a3ee [Accessed 28/02/26]