—  About

Maria lee may be vertically challenged, but she “walks with purpose”. She’s been named:

“Creative Director of the Year” by Ad Age A-List & Creativity Awards | ”Creative Team of the Year” by Campaign US Awards | “Champion of Change” by Campaign US Awards | “Creator of World Changing Ideas” by Fast Company | “Rising Star of Madison Avenue” by Business Insider | ”Girlboss” by LinkedIn | 2x Cannes Young Lion | “Mother of Hounds” by friends & family

Maria builds brands into culture. With a designer’s eye and a challenger’s mindset, she makes bold ideas that travel through conversations and technology. She has led work for Starbucks Global, Instacart, Google, Xfinity, Smithsonian, PepsiCo, Chase and New Balance, and for challenger brands including NCSOFT Games, Pennington, Journeys and truth.

Her brand platform for Instacart The World Is Your Cart drove record app downloads and weekly sales, ahead of its IPO. She helped return Starbucks to its roots with the Super Bowl relaunch as The Starbucks Coffee Company. For Pennington, a humble grass seed brand with no ad on the game, she stole the online conversation by directly challenging the NFL with #FlipTheTurf. For Fuser, she turned a game launch into a live Twitch DJ battle against Diplo that saw 7x more viewers than Coachella. She also taught millions of people around the world how to use AI Voice Assistants.

And with no brief, budget or client, she created Respond2Racism: an AI-powered bot to combat anti-Asian hate during the pandemic. It prompted Twitter to change its policy and was recognized by Cannes Lions, the ANA, and Fast Company as a World Changing Idea.

She builds teams that make work both brave and effective, the kind that takes courage. Courage to challenge the industry. Courage to push boundaries. Courage to take calculated risks. She teaches, mentors, and juries globally.

Her motto is simple: Hungry dogs run faster.

Give her a shout: marialeedesign@gmail.com

—  Get In Touch

Email
LinkedIn
RECOGNITION

Ad Age A-List & Creativity
Campaign US Inspiring Women
Business Insider
Fast Company
Girlboss
Bloomberg News
WARC
Ad Council + Asian American Marketing & Advertising Townhall
ABC News, Al Jazeera
3AF, Ad Council - Love Has No Labels
D&AD
Clio Awards
One Show
Art Directors Club
Festival of Media North America
The Webby
Graphis Advertising Annual
2014 + 2016 Cannes Young Lions
Muse by Clio
National Addy Awards
US Ad of the Week
Creativity - Editor’s Pick
MediaPost Awards
Direct To Consumer Ad Awards
Shorty Awards
Hatch Awards 

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Experience

Anomaly
Droga5
Goodby Silverstein & Partners
Google
72andSunny
BSSP
Arnold Worldwide
Rhode Island School of Design (RISD)

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Clio Awards Jury
Campaign US Inspiring Women Awards Jury
ADC of Canada Jury
ANA Multicultural & Inclusive Marketing Jury
Festival of Media North America Awards Jury
Webby Awards Jury
Shorty Impact Awards Jury
AdForum PHNX Jury
Creator of Respond2Racism
Co-founder of GS&P’s first AAPI ERG
Creative Education Volunteer @ 826 Valencia
Instructor at r/advertising school on reddit
4A’s Multicultural Advertising Intern Program