Following a string of national and international new business wins, and a continued pattern of growth and expansion, STW’s brand agency Cornwell has announced two senior hires.
Quan Payne joins the agency as executive creative director, tasked with overseeing the agency’s creative offer across all clients, both national and international, while further building its creative team and providing valuable mentoring.
Also joining Cornwell’s senior ranks is Alissa Byrne (pictured below), as account director – the agency’s first Sydney appointment.
Cornwell CEO Sally Dobell said the hires were part of a broad strategy to “expand Cornwell into a true ‘brand experience’ agency in both the Melbourne and Sydney markets”.
“Quan and Alissa bring strong creative and account service skills to our team. They are both exciting hires bringing unique capabilities that will further drive our already outstanding business growth to date,” she said.
STW CEO Mike Connaghan said the new hires were “testament to Sally and the quality of the team and business she is building”.
“Clients are looking for long term brand partners and quality brand design solutions,” he said. “This is evident with the early success of Cornwell’s entry into the Sydney market. Cornwell is fast becoming an Australian brand powerhouse and its latest hires will add further opportunity for growth.”
Payne has diverse background across brand and design, most recently as Creative Director for Laird + Partners in New York. He has also worked as Nike Global art director – London Olympics and design director of Frost Design/Woolworths South Africa, with experience in creative and art direction on some of the world’s most recognised brands including Calvin Klein, Swarovski and Nike. Given his strong creative credentials, Dobell said Payne had been specifically appointed to lead the business into a new era of brand and design.
“Someone of Quan’s calibre enables us to provide our creative team and clients with the leadership and talent across a diverse range of clients and disciplines such as brand strategy – graphic design – advertising communication – activation - digital – data, spatial and experiential design. Cornwell has a strong reputation for the quality of our thinking and creative so it was also important to ensure we continue to build on this across both our offices.”
Dobell said Byrne was Cornwell’s first appointment to its Sydney office, bringing more than 10 years of experience across brand and advertising communications.
“Having a strong mix of experience across a wide variety of brand capabilities will be increasingly important as Cornwell continues to grow, and we’re thrilled to have found that in Alissa,” she said.
“Her proven client management expertise and team leadership skills are the perfect addition to our already strong team, and we’re looking forward to capitalising on the great opportunities we’ve identified for our new Sydney office.”
Cornwell is part of STW, Australasia’s marketing content and communications group.