Help us support minority creatives

I founded Idea Dolls London after experiencing gender discrimination at an international, multi-award winning advertising agency. I was told I would struggle to make it in the industry because of my 'oversensitivity'. Specifically, I was told: because I was a woman. Sadly, this kind of incident is pretty common in the advertising industry, an industry that's hard to break into if you're from a minority background - or stay in if you're a woman who is 'oversensitive'.

I wanted to start an agency where diversity is celebrated - diversity of religion, gender and sexual orientation. Where introverts are respected and not forced to work 9-5 under glaring fluorescent lights, where mental health is understood and women’s cycles are respected. A space where it is OK to not come in if you have your period and you don’t need to fake a headache. A space where you don’t need to come in, really at all - unless you want to work from a base, and my dream is to create that safe base, from an office in Camden Town - the home of the oddballs, the brave and the downright bonkers. 

Our work has been celebrated in some of the most well-respected design blogs around - Packaging of the World, The Dieline and World Brand Design to name a few. Now we need your help to build the base we desperately need, so that we can start offering decent, well-paid jobs and experience to those who historically have not been represented in this space.

We need your help

The pandemic has hit us hard and our dream of building our office base in Camden had to be put on hold after almost 6 months of no new business. We weren't able to support the designers and writers who rely on us for an income, let alone support diverse talent fresh from uni which deserves to be recognised.

Our pay-it-forward idea

We’d like to raise £10k (half from crowdsourcing, and half through the other funding available in the scheme) to pay for a 4 person office space in Camden Town. With this space, we can offer paid experience training to a kickstarter who might have never worked in an office environment before, helping them build their confidence in a work environment and open their horizons to opportunities in the industry. We will also have space to train one more intern - on a paid salary and will offer the opportunity to either a creative living with diagnosed mental health challenges, a female university leaver, transgender creative, or a creative from BAME background.

• For every £50 we receive, we’ll give one hour of our time to offering advice and support to a minority culture or woman creative, or a creative living with a diagnosed mental health condition.
• For every £200 we receive we’ll give you a ‘Idea Dolls sponsor’ certificate and a tour round the office to see the work we’ve achieved once we launch.

Thank you so much from the Idea Dolls, and in advance from the future Idea Dolls you’ve helped create xxx