I pull ideas out, and put them into the world with wide range of services for unique projects. I can help your launch your product’s maiden voyage, or assist in bringing it to its next incarnation. Book my services modularly, as part of a package, or hire me for fractional roles.
What I do
Brand & Creative Leadership
The worst fate of any creative project is having a great idea and it’s launched late, missing the mark, not hitting its full potential, or even worse—shelved.
Creative teams need good leadership to bring their ideas to life. That means leadership beyond effective project management. It’s someone with the vision and experience to tie your business goals to tanglible, creative results. And to do it on time, in scope, and while growing your team into the best creatives they can be.
I’ve got over 20 years’ experience with leading creative teams through processes, shaping their approach, managing stakeholders, and growing talents.
Hire me as fractional leadership, per-project, or for creative coaching.
Book & Magazine Editorial
I’ve been a working editor since I was a teenager, editing for school newspapers right up to serving as Editor in Chief of Time Out Tokyo and International Editor at Large at Harper’s Bazaar Japan. I’ve edited everything from translated poetry fiction, to nonfiction and for newsrooms like Moviepilot.
Need help with writer’s block, developing your voice as a writer, or how to get started turning your idea into a book? I can help with writing and book coaching. I also occasionally take on mentees.
If you’re an author or literary agent preparing a manuscript for acquisition or publication, I offer the following services for all genres, poetry, and English translations from German, Japanese, Spanish, and French:
Editorial assessments
Developmental editing
Line editing
Copyediting & proofreading
Fact checking
Beta reading & sensitivity reading
Writing & creative process coaching
Hire me per-project or add me to your list of trusted editors. I’m open to building relationships as an external contractor with trad publishing houses and indie presses, too.
Brand, Content, & Strategy
Sure, I write and edit. But I also do UX writing and VUI scripts, too. Or contract me to make your next chatbot project more customer-friendly and effective.
But what I get most excited about is cultivating and serving an audience that needs quality content. That goes beyond writing blogposts and text content for social media; it’s crafting a long-game story around your project or product that converts into an audience who feels spoken-to and validated. This includes:
Brand Books, Tone of Voice & Style Guides
Brand & Communications Strategy
Marketing Communications
CRM Communications
Content Design & Strategy
UX writing and usability assessments
And don’t forget the dreaded PR-bloat: I’ll make sure your brand maintains its identity in the media, no matter the content. All this—and localisation for several languages with quality translations and transcreated content.
Creative Project Management
It’s all well and good to have a creative, editorial, or comms project in mind. But how do you get it off the ground and running so it delivers on time and with learnings?
I create sustainable and scalable workflows, and project plans. I execute them so that your message gets to the right people—be it a small magazine, a content heavy app with regular production cycles, or overseeing licensee brand standards of a major title.
Language Technology & Localisation
Language is the most important thing in my life. It defines who we are, how we relate to others, and how we stand in the world. I love technology and and see it as a way to bring us into better relationships with language, practical and critical use of language, and to make it accessible and better for everyone. This is a core principle of my work as a trained psycholinguist, translator, and psycholinguist—and I invite you to work on it with me.
Conversation design, chatbots (with or without marketing angles), and other intersections of language and technology are the projects I am particularly interested in. But I also provide quality translation, transcreation, transcription and localisations for your publication, platform, app, or marketing campaigns. I even won a FORGE 2022 Torichie Award for Best Data Application for communications modelling on an AI-driven editorial project!
Narrative Design & Game Writing
Video games are one of the most exciting ways we can be someone else, somewhere else, something else we only imagined was possible. My narrative design approach aims to be subversive, inventive, intersectional, and never what’s expected.
I don’t stop at video games, either. Need flavor text? I got you. Boardgames, card games and immersive experiences are also part of my repertoire.
I’m available for narrative design and game writing work on a per-project, collaborative, or contracted basis.
Japan Market Consulting
I’m an accredited Japanologist with the European Association of Japanese Studies, with over a decade's worth of experience living, studying, and working in Japan. I hold a JLPT N2 certificate, and love working on projects to improve how Japanese is used in apps, marketing and other products originating outside of Japan. If you want insight into the Japanese language or market for optimising your product or platform, then let’s talk.
My particular areas of interest range from cultural issues of language education through advertising, publishing, journalism, fashion, and reach all the way to traditional clothing culture, gender issues, and the intersections of these topics with Western culture.
Creative & Fashion Consulting
In parallel with working in fashion and fashion publishing in Tokyo for a decade, I've also received certified training in kimono culture, pattern-making, and have created aesthetic concepts and directed for both artistic and commercial fashion projects. In addition to hands-on fashion work, I have been commissioned to write fashion criticism, regular columns, and other content surrounding fashion, art, film, and culture.