Creative direction
Case studies utilising Creative direction
38 projects demonstrating creative direction, ordered for your focus.
Streetohome Chosen Family Pods
Reframed the conversation on homelessness — from surface-level symptoms to root-cause understanding — through a communication system built for clarity, dignity and long-term engagement.
The Drawing Hope Project
A concept-driven visual storytelling project that translates drawings by children living with life-threatening illness into fully realized photographic worlds.
QUIRK Parfum — Wear Who You Are
A consumer fragrance brand and campaign system positioning scent as an extension of identity, not a category — built around individuality, confidence and self-expression.
St. Joseph's Hospice — Always Together, Even When We're Apart
Repositioned Hospice's flagship Hike for Hospice around a unifying idea during COVID — and doubled the most successful fundraising year in the campaign's history.
Luma Skin Studio
Brand identity and visual system for a modern skin studio — a clean, warm, confident look designed to travel across storefront, packaging, digital and social.
Jarden / Newell Brands - Creative Direction Across a Household Portfolio
Four years leading creative for one of North America's largest household portfolios - including Crock-Pot, Coleman, Sunbeam, Bionaire and Black & Decker small appliances - across packaging, retail, POS, product launches, sales enablement and multi-market campaigns.
Sunbeam - The Red & Silver Brand Refresh (Still in Market Today)
Led the ground-up redesign of Sunbeam's global small-appliance packaging system - retiring the beige, cluttered late-80s look and introducing the bold red-and-silver architecture that still defines Sunbeam packaging on shelves today.
Ascend Fundraising Solutions - Creative Platform Across a National Nonprofit Roster
Ran the creative bench at a national fundraising agency, shaping the campaign look, voice and case-for-support systems behind a roster of nonprofit clients whose combined multi-year fundraising is measured in the billions.
Chai Lifeline Canada - Annual Campaign & Family-Support Storytelling
Built the visual and narrative platform for a national children's-illness charity - annual campaigns, donor materials, program storytelling and event creative - through years where the organization's public voice and fundraising trajectory both had to grow at the same time.
St. Joseph's Hospice - Rebuilding the Brand Language for a Community-Facing Healthcare Organization
Rebuilt the visible language of a hospice from the inside - brand system, voice, editorial standards and campaign creative - so the organization's public face finally matched the quality of care it was actually delivering.
The About Game - An Interactive About Page That Rewards Curiosity
Turned a portfolio About page into a playable experience: a card-based decoder, a Wheel-of-Fortune-style solver, a recipe box, a trading-card set and a curiosity ledger that quietly assembles a custom bio from what the visitor actually explored.
shawnvandaele.lovable.app - An AI-Tailored Portfolio Built by Hand
Designed, built and shipped a portfolio that rewrites its own hero copy, resume ordering and case-study emphasis based on the viewer's active focus - single-handed, using AI workflows as a working partner rather than a shortcut.
AI-Enabled Creative Workflow System - Prompts, Guardrails, Ship
Built a working AI-in-the-loop practice for real creative production - prompt libraries, editorial guardrails, thumbnail generation, tailored copy, tag matching, admin scaffolding - the pieces that turn model access into a repeatable operating system rather than a demo.
Rainbow Faith & Freedom — Design Direction
An advocacy campaign and communications system for a global nonprofit working at the intersection of faith, human rights and 2SLGBTQ+ inclusion.
Walk Off The Earth — Band Photography
Editorial band photography and post-production for one of Canada's most-touring bands — cinematic frames built for press, tour and social use.
BC Parks — RFP Design & Creative Direction
Editorial-grade RFP design and layout system built to make a complex, high-stakes proposal read as clearly as it competes.
Fanshawe College — Digital Master Class
Instructor examples from the Fanshawe College Digital Master Class — real-world Photoshop compositing and digital art techniques taught to working designers.
Ivey Business Case — Debt Stigmatization
Business case design for an Ivey study on debt stigmatization — editorial layout built for clarity and dignity around a difficult topic.
Mission Brewing — Comic Con Magazine Spread
Illustrated magazine ad spread for Mission Brewing at Comic Con — playful, story-driven design for a consumer brand moment.
NewCo — Celebrity Alcohol Sales Deck
Brand identity and celebrity-backed sales deck for a new alcohol venture — polished, premium and ready for the room.
Photoshop Composite — Behind the Scenes
A behind-the-scenes timelapse of a single Drawing Hope Project composite — every layer, every blend, from blank canvas to finished photo.
Rainbow Faith & Freedom — Infographics & Socials
Infographic and social design system for Rainbow Faith & Freedom — turning complex advocacy data into scroll-stopping social assets.
Select Photo Manipulations
A selection of composite photography and digital manipulation work across personal and client projects — proof of the craft under the concept.
Select Wedding Photography
Selected wedding photography — documentary, editorial and portrait frames edited to a consistent cinematic tone.
St. Joseph's Hospice — Connected Through Cooking
Video promo for St. Joseph's Hospice's Connected Through Cooking program — story, edit, motion and logo built as one piece.
St. Joseph's Hospice — Hike for Hospice Promo
Promo reel for Hike for Hospice — the video anchor of the fundraising campaign that doubled the program's best year.
St. Joseph's Hospice — Program Infographic
Program infographic for St. Joseph's Hospice — clear, warm, human information design for a healthcare audience.
Domestic Chaos — Conceptual Photo Series
A surreal, levitation-based conceptual photo series exploring the emotional weight of everyday domestic life.
Port Rupert Port Authority — RFP
RFP and brand-adjacent visual system for the Port of Prince Rupert — clear infographics, considered layout and AI image development.
Rainbow Faith & Freedom — Promo Video Reel
A promotional video reel for Rainbow Faith & Freedom — story, edit, motion and copy stitched into one advocacy piece.
From The Bridge — Band Promo
Promo photography and composite art for the band From The Bridge — cinematic, moody imagery built for tour and press use.
Life in Detox — Book Cover
Book cover design, typesetting and copy for a memoir on recovery — restraint, warmth and quiet dignity across every touchpoint.
Bike4Chai - Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Event Creative
Anchored the annual creative for a two-day peer-to-peer cycling event that riders return to year after year - not a single-touch campaign, but a repeatable platform that had to feel meaningful the fifth time you signed up as much as the first.
Aprons in Action - Sunbeam's Philanthropic Platform
Extended the Sunbeam brand into a philanthropic platform - Aprons in Action - that tied the household-appliance business to a broader purpose without leaning on the usual cause-marketing shortcuts.
Big Brothers Big Sisters - Mentorship Storytelling & Fundraising Creative
Told the story behind mentorship without turning young people into props - fundraising materials, campaign creative and community assets that led with the relationship, not the recruiting funnel.
Shawn Van Daele Photography - Brand Identity for a Working Photographer
Built the brand for my own photography business from the client's side of the desk - identity, print collateral, website, contracts, social presence - so the business could grow without every new booking starting from scratch.
After Benny - Long-form Editorial & Book Design
Designed and produced a long-form book project as a companion to the personal editorial and memoir work that also produced Life in Detox - text, image, sequence and physical object all treated as one design problem.
Shawn's Recipe Box - A Recipe Product Design Playground
Built a recipe collection as a small product - trading-card recipes, an admin backend for adding by URL or from scratch, on-the-fly meal imagery, and share / email / PDF flows for anyone who wants to actually cook one.
Creative Director, Consumer Brands & CPG
2005 - 2009Jarden Consumer Solutions / Newell Brands
Led and mentored a 4-6 person in-house creative team responsible for international brand, packaging, retail marketing and product-launch execution across an 18+ brand portfolio
Founder + Executive Creative Lead
2011 - 2016The Drawing Hope Project
End-to-end: concept, family collaboration, photography, art direction, production and media rollout
Art Direction · Design · Production Leadership
Earlier careerAgency & In-house Creative Teams
Agency and in-house creative roles across consumer, healthcare, education, government and cultural clients - plus early music/entertainment publicity photography and album artwork connected to Sony Music. The range that underpins today's leadership work.
Marketing & Communications Manager
2025 - 2026Chai Lifeline Canada
Directed Bike4Chai creative across 500+ coordinated deliverables - signage, environmental graphics, stage/screen, sponsor, digital and print
Creative Director, Marketing & Communications
2021 - 2023Ascend Fundraising Solutions
Directed creative strategy and execution for seven-figure fundraising campaigns; recommendations influenced investment across TV, digital, direct mail, print and OOH
Founder & Creative Director
2009 - PresentShawn Van Daele Creative / Photography
Founded and scaled a two-studio creative business to ~$1.5M annual revenue across Toronto/Milton and Cambridge, owning strategy, operations, marketing, sales, talent, customer experience and creative quality
Art direction + design leadership, Visual identity + design systems and Campaign concepts + hero assets.
