Mayda

The Mayda: Exploring the Unknown.

The Mayda will be represented multi-disciplinary Executive Creative Director and Director Ben Smith.

With a design-thinking approach born out of his first love of product design, Ben combines creative vision, technical knowledge, and curiosity for the new, to deliver innovative and thoughtful work across a variety of projects encompassing live-action, animation, VFX, and technology.
Ben has won direction, innovation, and VFX awards, and is one of the chief architects of the revolutionary BLACKBIRD®, the Cannes Gold Lion winning virtual car.

Ben is a Founder and Executive Creative Director at Mayda, a creative collective formed from the worlds of advertising, technology, film and gaming. Mayda recently was named #4 on the 2024 AdAge Production Company A-List.

According to early explorers, Mayda was a non-existent island in the North Atlantic that, despite appearing on several published maps at various points in history, was never actually found.
Aside from being a provocative name for a creative collective, Mayda is also a philosophy for working in an ever changing environment, embracing challenging conditions as a creative catalyst, and searching for innovation gold.

Ben will use his own multi-disciplined journey as a case study for how to “Navigate Future Stories”, working with intent and bravery to explore the unknown.
Using decisions made and behind the scenes to reveal philosophies and coping mechanisms that have led to The Mayda Creative company’s broad range of impactful work.

Ben will speak at the Forward Festival Berlin in August. Next to him, you will be able to hear Creatives like Hervisions, OLF, GRIF and many more.