Dream Teams: Max and Nicole Bon de Veire Make up Both Sides of the Brain
Max Bon de Veire, principal and Nicole Bon de Veire, principal and creative director at Re, part of M&C Saatchi Group, have known each other since 2009. So let’s do some number crunching – known each other for 14 years, have been working together (at two separate occasions, reminds Max) for seven, and have been married for four! In 2020 they also had their first son, Viggo. Little did they know this long of a working relationship would sprout from just their meeting at university in Sydney.
Not only did they not anticipate a long-lasting partnership, but also remember they didn’t particularly like each other in the beginning. According to Max, that changed pretty quickly and just enough for them to be now married with a kid and working side by side for as long as they have.
Max and Nicole’s first project together has to have been at design school, but ‘for the life of [them]’ they can’t remember what it was about. “The process was actually great, mostly because we had low expectations of each other and didn’t want to work together, but once we realised that we actually make a great team, it was smooth sailing,” says Max. “I do remember the one project when my view of him completely changed, which was the end of year exhibition project,” recalls Nicole. “I think that’s when I truly realised the strength of us working together and collaboratively – which we have done pretty much ever since.”
But what made them really click and get over that initial frustration? The answer is hiding behind a few reasons, according to Max. “First and foremost, we have complementary personalities and interests,” he says. “That’s what everything has been built on. We’ve also grown together since the very beginning – so it’s pretty safe to say that who we are at work is in part because of the other person. We’ve learned so much from each other.” These days, Max and Nicole find themselves having to divide and conquer to cover more ground too – both at work and at home. So they have ways of not getting stuck on problems – both of them are the type of efficient person who would rather push the project moving forward and be the voice of reason and opinion. The main goal is clear – they both want to support each other. That’s why it works.
That similarity dates back to the Sydney days, however much younger Max and Nicole would want to disagree. A shared experience of being the ‘foreign’ student, and just general alignments of character contribute to a large part of the matchmaking points. “We both had grown up in Europe and were on our own on the other side of the world during very formative years,” points out Nicole. “So, we had that natural bond. Then again, there’s the strategist and designer relationship which has influenced our ways of being and thinking for a long time. Together we make up a whole brain.”
Sometimes though, even the two sides of the brain challenge each other – especially in creativity. Both Max and Nicole aren’t afraid of disagreement because they know it doesn’t mean anything personal – so they don’t allow it to fuel frustration. Besides, they know that provocation makes for better design. "When done right, design has a unique potential to solve problems and help organisations make progress," they remind. So for them, it's important to keep both sides of the brain working together. Here, the benefit of knowing each other since 2009 also shines through. Understanding each other’s habits, thoughts and ways of being, helps them place smaller issues in perspective to the bigger picture. “So, we probably avoid most frustrations because of that,” concludes Nicole. She quickly adds, “He does take forever getting ready in the morning though.”
What Nicole calls ‘the unspoken rules of engagement’ come into play from time to time too – but she also reflects that there is a certain ease that comes with having different roles, so neither of them steps on the other’s toes. For Max, respect and never losing sight of the abovementioned bigger picture is an unbreakable mantra.
When it comes to the start of their professional relationship, Max remembers that Nicole put his name forward at the first agency that they ended up working at – that was long after the uni feud had settled and the two were certain they were the perfect match. She got hired as a designer at Houston Group (known as Houston) in Sydney straight out of university, so when the company needed a strategist she was quick to recommend Max, who shortly ended up joining. “I suppose she was the one who ‘put’ us together,” says Max.
Since those early days at Houston, a lot has changed. Today, Max and Nicole are setting up a new European base for Re, out of Stockholm. Only launched less than two months ago, the two are noticing new and totally unexpected creative challenges peak from the horizon. Driving growth, building the best team, playing a part in a growing Group network in Europe and getting used to being back here keeps them both busy, but Nicole reminds us that it’s each other that they can always count on: “Going through it with Max really is the dream.” Max agrees: “It’s an incredible time for us, and we are seeing great momentum with some really interesting clients. I wouldn’t want to do it with anyone else.”
The duo’s current journey requires flexibility and adaptability, while knowing how to lean on their previous experiences, but applying them in very diverse ways. “Sweden is home to me,” says Nicole, “but it’s a different landscape to Sydney, which we’re grateful for. It’s not often you get to be able to make such a big change, especially without having to quit your job.” But regardless of all the challenges, nothing amounts to their most incredible and probably hardest collaborative project yet: their son Viggo.
The current challenges Max and Nicole overcoming together are just another thing atop of the mountain of proof that being part of a duo is the best way to work – regardless of your profession, thinks Max. “It’s very special to have a partner in any job – someone who remembers and appreciates the same journey you’ve been on. All the shortcuts to approaching a problem or an opportunity that become available to you. We get the basics out of the way quickly so we can focus on more important things.”
Nicole, on the other hand, believes that creativity, more than any other line of work, benefits from a partner most. “It’s a very specific industry,” she says. “You must be in it to really understand it and its demands, both professionally and socially. So having a partner that understands and partakes in that is invaluable.”
In terms of inspiration, both Max and Nicole believe that the wider Re team are among the most impressive people on the planet – and with good reason. Spread across the globe, they are the main bulk of Max and Nicole’s creative collaborators. “Our global team and pretty much every person I’ve ever worked with are my inspiration,” says Nicole. “Always the people just starting out in their careers too – they have new and different ways of thinking.”
So after 14 years of knowing each other, one kid together and two shared jobs, Max and Nicole have learned a whole lot from one another. “Nicole has taught me how to keep setting consistently higher standards to what we do. She’s super curious and always finds the next level. Her quality of thinking and calibre of design makes the work go further, so I’m always trying to learn from her.”
Max isn’t the only one learning though: “I’ve picked up a lot of Max’s ways of thinking,” admits Nicole, “from how to really interrogate a brief, to finding completely different questions to ask through the process. It helps me to reframe how I’m thinking so that we can make better creative decisions and really push ourselves.”
