Harbour Appoints First Creative Directors

Clockwise from top left: Thibault, Mick, Yann, Grant

Yann-Gael Cobigo and Thibault Michal have been appointed Harbour’s first ever creative directors, working alongside creative partners, Mick Mahoney and Grant Parker to develop the creative offering of the rapidly growing collective. 

The Cannes and One Show winning team forged their early careers in Paris, before coming to London eight years ago. Most recently they were CD’s at Leagas Delaney, having previously worked separately at Havas, R/GA, Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam, AMV/ BDO, BBH and Media Arts Lab.

Mick commented: “Yann and Thibs have been working with us for a year now on a freelance basis, their commitment to and belief in what Harbour is building is huge. They have made themselves indispensable, creatively and culturally. They are natural creative leaders and radical creative thinkers.”

Thib said:  "We thank Mick and everyone at Harbour for being crazy brave enough to trust two Frenchmen. Harbour is built to be an incredible place to unleash creativity in every aspect of a brand’s behaviours, not only advertising. It's a rare opportunity in a career to get to shape the future of such a promising business, and work with people you just love to work with. It's obvious for us that Harbour is made to have an incredible future. Trust us, it will be obvious for everyone very soon."

Yann said: “I’m truly delighted. When the people who offer you to work with them are all household names with an impressive track record of amazing campaigns, the type of work you look at thinking ‘I wish I’ve done that’, it's hard not to be humbled and excited. 

There are possibly many different answers to what the future of agencies should be, and I feel Harbour found the best one. The amazing team of people they’ve managed to get together is truly moving in the same direction.”

During their 12 months at Harbour, Yann-Gael and Thibault have created campaigns for John Lewis Finance, Fitbit, McCarthy Stone and most recently, the much-lauded Euro2020 work for The Athletic. They will be responsible going forward for overseeing several Harbour accounts, including The Athletic and several recent new business wins.