Sam Cable: Cutwater, San Francisco Diary #2

Sam Cable is a copywriting student at Miami Ad School Sydney, currently interning at top US creative ad agency Cutwater, San Francisco as part of her portfolio course.

My second week at the agency.

The sails are one of my favourite things about Cutwater. The sun and wind pass through the skyline; ebbing and flowing with the canvas. You can hear it lightly flapping in the breeze and the whisper of a slight tinkering of metal on metal. My mind tends to wander and listen.

The term ‘Cutwater’ is derived from the specific point of impact a boat has with the water. Their mission is to help companies find their cutwater — the sharpest visual & verbal articulation of the brand’s ideal.

I had the pleasure of interviewing Tina Montemayor, the Creative Service Manager at Cutwater. She has been aboard the voyage for the last two years and filled me in on some of the history at the agency.

Before landing the Cutwater expedition, she was an account executive at a PR firm where she started 3 years prior as an intern. She got the taste for advertising as a junior copywriter before that and never got over it. In 2013, she transitioned back to her creative roots and joined Cutwater to help Chuck McBride and Christian Hughes grow their vision as a host and executive admin.

During this time, Cutwater moved locations from a small loft downtown to a bright, open space located in the ad ghetto. Tina helped craft the space, from sewing the curtains in the kitchen to driving six different, ten meters sails back to the agency.

They settled on a pair of enormous sails currently hanging 14 meters high.  Other decorations in the space include an assortment of vibrantly coloured boat motors, wall of polished rowing oars and a California Republic surfboard.

Tina concluded the interview with the statement, “There is a real sense of ownership here”.

This weeks Haiku:

What a job to hang,

Sails fourteen meters high.

Ladder or giraffe?