Meet the team

Simon is one of Embrace’s founding partners, and his greatest achievement continues to be that Embrace remains a thriving independent agency. Experiencing different business cultures around the world – along with sampling the local wines - keeps Simon interested. When he’s not driving Embrace forward, he can often be found driving his kids around as their personal taxi driver.

Paul is a founding partner of Embrace and brings over 20 years industry experience to his role as head of all things digital. His appetite for taking on big projects, smashing out great results, and making the young guns look a bit slack is also reflected in his passion for long distance running. When he’s not doing that, he likes to grow things – either in the garden, or in his budding cryptocurrency portfolio.

Paul is a founding partner at the agency and brings over 25 years experience to his role as creative director, strategist and copywriter. In that time he’s seen design trends come and go, but continues to get excited about how the best creative ideas can persuade. When he’s not crafting a laser-sharp proposition for a brand, he can often be found enjoying his passion for cycling and donning ill-fitting lycra. 

Dave has over 20 years' experience building and delivering digital systems, across a wide range of clients and sectors, including intranet systems for Formula 1 sponsorship and logistics applications for beer brands. When Dave isn’t developing Embrace digital projects, or researching and tinkering with new digital technologies, he enjoys playing golf, supporting his kids’ sporting ambitions, or watching game in the South African bush.

Katy returns to Embrace after 5 years client side, working for one of the world’s largest brands. Having worked ‘both sides of the fence’ she likes to put herself in the client’s shoes whilst approaching things from a creative and strategic angle. Katy loves a spreadsheet so you’d think she was a bit straight but outside of work she loves to cook from scratch, mix a mean gin cocktail, practice yoga and run around after her daughter Lola.

Jasmin brings a diverse range of experience to her role and has previously worked on FMCG, financial, data-driven and experiential projects at award winning agencies. Despite being colour blind, Jasmin knows client challenges are rarely black and white, and satisfaction comes from going beyond a brief to deliver a real solution. She is also a keen netball player, which nicely cancels out the effects of being Embrace’s biggest biscuit consumer.

A former Oasis music video extra, Jo is our Supersonic business development lead. Jo has over 20 years creative industry experience, with nearly a decade in business development, and has won projects in brand, corporate comms, digital and employee engagement. Jo enjoys the creative and music scene in her home town of Brighton, when she isn’t braving the English Channel for a swim with her two children.

Alastair has over 30 years creative industry experience, and in that time has worked with some of the world’s biggest brands, from FMCG giants, to international banks. He has led award winning projects for a number of investment and asset management firms, and as a former CERN employee is a great believer in the power of research. When not working he loves walking his dog, Merlin, or enjoying some golf, skiing or sailing (not all at once).

There are three things you should know about Laura: 1) Without her, Embrace would be a lot less organised – and definitely less fun. 2) Holding everything together at work is only slightly easier than looking after her two young kids. 3) Laura loves lists so much, she insisted we write her biography like this.

Despite being baby-faced enough to still get asked for ID at pubs, Ben has nearly a decade of creative agency experience. In that time, he has worked for a wide range of brands, big and small, and loves projects that blend together robust brand thinking and digital application to create modern, effective design solutions. Ben is a massive fan of anything two-wheeled and pedal-powered, and possesses a cool but useless skill; very bendy thumbs.

Matt is a multi-disciplinary designer who finds great satisfaction in working on conceptually driven projects that require complex problem solving. As a Blue Peter badge winner, it’s clear his appetite for success started at a young age. Matt enjoys doodling, baking, and playing seven-a-side football - in the hope that one day he will finally get the call up to go pro.

With ten years industry experience, handling large client projects for both above and below the line campaigns, Sophie is adept at getting under the skin of a project and delivering the right solution. Fluent in French, a coffee connoisseur, and a Negroni nut, Sophie enjoys the finer things in life – making Embrace the perfect match.   

With a background in academic publishing and an MSc, Lara uses her smarts to help manage our digital projects, getting involved at every stage to help deliver great final products. Her flexibility and adaptability also extend to outside of work, where she is both a certified Pilates instructor - co-managing a local studio - and mum to a young daughter.

Siba brings an entrepreneurial flair to his role, having previously built and deployed a number of digital projects on his own before joining Embrace. Siba enjoys working with an international team, and he is always pushing his own skills and understanding of web technologies. Outside of work he keeps his skills sharp on the football pitch, or doing his best to relax with his young family.