Studio Visit: Vault49

When he started a business straight out of college with a friend, little did John Glasgow know, that it would grow into a renowned global agency.

Now as Executive Creative Director of Vault49, based in New York, John tells us about the challenges of running a business.

Can you explain your job in two sentences? 

Overseeing the quality of the creative output at Vault49. Creating and maintaining a strong internal culture across both of our studios. 

What’s a typical workday for you? 

Finding moments within a working day to make people laugh. Whether that’s with a client or my internal team, I always seek out opportunities to be ridiculous. 

What are the perks? 

This has evolved over the years, in the early days is was seeing our hand screen-printed designs pasted across the walls of London and disrupting the creative scene with our illustration style. Now I get my kicks from growing a global agency with offices in both NY and LDN, still being disruptive, but within the world of brand experience.

What are the challenges?

Navigating a business through this pandemic. This is uncharted territory for us, but it also an opportunity to re-think your business model like never before.

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To be a success in this industry, you need to commit to hard work. Keep exploring different ways of working, experiment and experiment some more.

What are you most proud of? 

Starting a business out of college with a friend that has grown into and global agency. Being a black man who is a co-founder of a global agency. And most recently, going back to our street art origins to amplify the BLM movement by flypostering the walls of NYC with slogans supporting Black Lives Matter and Asian Lives Matter. 

How did you get into doing what you do? Were there hurdles along the way?  

Art was the only lesson I enjoyed at school, so I pushed forward on this path to see where it would take me. I became more aware that I was a black man in this field of work, because of the lack of black representation around me. This only got more exasperating, the more successful our business became. 

Is this the career you thought you’d have? 

No Chance! The company my business partner and I created is way beyond my expectations and it all happened so rapidly. I saw myself at best making it to a senior designer for a design studio in London when I was a student.

Who do you look to for inspiration? 

Other black leaders in and outside of my field of work. Unfortunately, with limited numbers of black men and women in leadership roles, I look to them to gain insight when navigating predominately white spaces.

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To any young creatives that feels the background or community that they come from is under represented in the design industry and its discouraging them from pursuing a career in design, keep strong.

What advice would you offer someone wanting to break into the industry?

To be a success in this industry, you need to commit to hard work. Keep exploring different ways of working, experiment and experiment some more. Don’t be afraid to reinvent yourself multiple times throughout your career and don’t over think it. Keep doing creative stuff and you will find your way, your style, your voice.

Anything else you’d like to tell us, go for it. 

To any young creatives that feels the background or community that they come from is under represented in the design industry and its discouraging them from pursuing a career in design, keep strong. You are the next generation of young creatives who will reshape the current look and feel of the design industry into a more diverse one.

Follow Vault49: Website & Instagram

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