Mendl cake and pumpkin spiced lattes: how The Gate's newest creative duo feed their minds

Not every job would throw a new employee into a shoot abroad just weeks into starting, but that’s exactly what happened when Lucy Donagh joined Becky Reynolds at The Gate. She calls the experience a “baptism of fire”.

Thankfully the approach paid off, and three months after Donagh began her role, the pair have added Three Mobile-owned Smarty Mobile’s latest TV spot ‘Less Malarkey’, to their portfolios.

They first met when Reynolds, on the hunt for a new partner after the departure of her previous creative partner, came across Donagh’s portfolio and dropped her a line. A note saying “you seem fun” and a coffee later and (with the agency’s blessing) the rest was recent history.

Along with her previous partner Charlotte Alford, Donagh won a D&AD New Blood award in 2020 for ‘Am I Normal?’ The project, which also appeared in Teen Vogue, encourages girls to learn more about their sexuality without resorting to gossip and Google.

Since graduating from the University of Gloucestershire, she has worked at McCann, Grey and BMB where her credits include Just Eat, Bentley and Unite for Students.

Reynolds, who has previously worked at agencies including Ogilvy, Iris and FCB London and placements at VCCP, JWT London and Leo Burnett, has credits for Very, the AA, Dove Masterbrand and more.

The pair share their sources of inspiration – from Hun culture to Wes Anderson and a clumsy tooth fairy.

Lucy Donagh

Mendl Cake

I was quite a loser as a teenager and I had different folders in YouTube saved of things that I found inspirational and I would rewatch them in the night. I couldn't work out what inspired me about them. I didn't know about art direction at the time.

I thought I wanted to be a director. I loved Wes Anderson, Baz Luhrmann – directors who build fantastic sets. I now realise I wasn't ever that interested in Wes Anderson's scripts, but I loved details like the Mendl's cake box in Grand Budapest Hotel. Young kids don't really get exposure to the more niche job tiles so directing was the only thing I knew of that world. I didn't know that there was also a director of photography, or any of the ins and and outs. It was only later that I realised it was the image I liked.

I'm quite new into art direction. I was with a different partner for years and we were both just creatives. People had assumed I was an art director for years because I’d been infatuated with that world. And then Becky was looking for a new partner as a traditional copywriter, and I remember thinking "I’m an art director".

The Tooth Fairy

My mum always nurtured a very creative environment. She works in health and safety but she's a very artistic person and she'd create the most crazy things in the house. If the tooth fairy came – it wouldn't be that a 20p coin was left under the pillow, she'd leave glitter all around the house. I had toy unicorns and they'd be destroyed and leave a note saying; "Sorry we crashed. We were flying around and we hit the wall," and there'd be an explosion of glitter.

We recently went to an exhibition in Bristol called Wake The Tiger which is a massive warehouse filled with 3D artworks and lots of local people and artists have participated. I love immersive, expansive experiences like that.

I think if she'd had the resources my mum would have ended up in a much more creative career but it's just not advertised to people. That's why things like the Jolt Academy, Havas Platform and Young Creative Council are so valuable.

After my degree in advertising at the University of Gloucestershire, I struggled to get my first internship. I was working in a restaurant back in Wales and I had a call from a woman who said "Look, you can start on Monday at Mother". I'd never worked a formal internship yet but I quit my job that Saturday and just went. I’d done the Jolt Academy and it was Yuliya Pankratova there that got me my first internship at Mother.

While I was studying my friends and I would get the bus to London and go to any book crits we could find. For example, at VCCP. They were run by Young Creative Council. I think things like that are so vital when you’re coming in with no contacts and no real idea of what advertising is other than a chance to be creative and a bit weird.

Baptisms of fire

It feels so glam to be two weeks into a job and told you’re on a production. You’re still wrestling through papers and the final details but having been on the journey from the storyboards to the end and to be developing the out-of-home and radio ads alongside it is really rewarding. It was a baptism of fire but it was a great way to get to know Becky as a partner.

One of my biggest takeaways from the work on Smarty Malarkey is to not be afraid to be quite hands on with something you weren’t in the beginnings of. It’s Becky’s scripts and you want to give them grace but it’s also important to know that you’re in the job for a reason and you’re there to think about how that looks and develop that world.

Another work I'm proud of is 'Am I Normal'. It was spec work that me and my previous partner Charlotte pursued alongside our jobs for a long time. It was very difficult to get off the ground but I'm proud of how we came up with it – we just got stuck in with pen and paper in a coffee shop. Then all of these companies like Lelo, the sex toy company and The Pleasure Project wanted to be involved.

As a Gen Z creative, I think it's a matter of taking your creativity and running with it. It’s so exciting that there’s so much more creative work that’s accessible for everyone. Everyone’s creating content constantly. I think the higher stakes mean you have to keep on top of your game. People are making amazing stuff in their bedrooms.

Other than that, my main tip is to be nice. The industry is small and you’ll meet people time-and-time again. People come around and it pays to be a nice person.

Becky Reynolds

Love and fear (Enamel plaques and NHS pamphlets)

I got into advertising after I applied to four different graphic design courses and an advertising and brand communications course. I remember sitting in a doctor’s office and looking at the NHS pamphlets and thinking, that’s what I’m going to be designing, and I didn’t want to do that.

I ended up going for this advertising course and it changed to creative advertising. I didn’t know what I was heading in to and I had no idea what a creative was. I had no idea this was even a career. But there were always signs that I was interested in advertising.

One Christmas my parents got me a HMV compilation of songs from ads. And then I always used to be obsessed with the enamel plaques in France where you place adverts. So I always had an interest in advertising without really knowing it.

I've always been a creative person and my parents also helped push that, especially my dad because he used to work doing window shop displays.

'I see myself as a bit of a basic bitch'

I hate that that's been turned into a negative. Ultimately being a basic bitch is just saying "I like what other women like''. I like pumpkin spiced lattes, I like Uggs and I don't see anything wrong with that.

The work that we’ve done for Very is based around Hun culture – there are millions of Huns out there and no one was talking to them. It’s such a fun brand to work on because I feel like I’m talking to my sister-in-law, and my sister-in-law is the prime target for Very.

The flamingo is called Kerry and Kerry is also my sister-in-law. Her mum passed away during Covid and her favourite animal is a flamingo, so it was such a nice tribute. I think my inspirations just wrap up in who I am and who my friends and family are. Very was also Hannah and I's first ever Christmas advert. Obviously, Christmas adverts are the UK’s SuperBowl, so to have one out there was amazing.

'Zig a Zag ah' and zig zags

I love Taylor Swift, Sabrina Carpenter and of course the Spice Girls. The line "Zig-a-zag-ah" was always super satisfying.

I think if you look at the creative industries people like to throw around obscure directors and indy artists and there's nothing wrong with that if that's your cup of tea. But I've never felt ashamed of what I like and being a bit basic can inspire work.

If you look at the Very Christmas ad, we used the Girls Aloud cover of Merry Xmas Everybody and there were all the comments on YouTube saying "Oh my god, they're using the Girls Aloud song," and it was nice to see that everyone was so excited about that.

A lot of my work is rooted in who I am and my experiences – the Smarty ad is actually inspired by my own long-distance relationship. I’ve been with my partner for six years and he lives in the south of France so that’s meant a lot of travelling around. There was one time in the airport where these two border control policemen just watched me go through these endless zigzags. And I remember thinking why do I feel so embarrassed?

Navigating advertising, however, I've had so many mentors that have kept me on the right path – André (Dédé) Laurentino who’s now deputy CCO in the EMEA region, VML ECD Juliana Paracencio who mentored me when she was at Ogilvy both on navigating internal politics and creatively, and Frances Leach at VCCP who encouraged me to pursue work for Better Fortune on the side with my previous creative partner Hannah. It's a helpline for the East and South East Asian community which they can call if they ever experience hate or racism. We created fortune cookies that encouraged people to be better allies but also told the community about the helpline itself

Daisy May Cooper

One of my favourite shows is This Country. I love Daisy May Cooper, I feel she understands life outside of London and there are nuances in This Country that I resonate with so much. I grew up in a tiny village outside of Southampton where there was one bus an hour.

Hybrid working has allowed me to move back to Southampton and I’ve bought a house there. It’s something I could never do in London. I also think it allows me to see a more realistic Britain. In London, you don’t always see what reality is like in the rest of the country, and I think that has helped with comedy-writing and going for that Hun target audience who normally reside outside the capital. It means I’m able to witness that more authentically.

Doing comedy as a woman can be hard, especially when you have a male creative director. It can be hard to sell your work because they don’t get the nuances of the female experience. However, Rob Bovington our ECD was fantastic, and he helped mentor me while I wrote the script for Smarty. I love watching comedy, so to actually start writing it was fantastic.

I think we all have a TV show in us, don’t we? That’s my next goal. I’ve got to start writing my pilot – that’s added to the list of things I need to do!

Very Demure

It might be a bit old now but I like the humour and I love that it took off from a single transgender creator.

I like that it isn’t just celebrities or brands who start these trends, it’s random people from all over the world. I do think TikTok is where everything’s happening – you don’t have to doomscroll every night but just having access to the app and having a look every now and again is a must.