We’re delighted to announce that Jonny and Rebecca (Bex) Rae-Evans are joining us, sharing the role of our new co-Chief Design Officer(s). 

They have so much experience in design, innovation, and strategy, underpinned by a deep commitment to design ethics and working for social good. They’ll be joining our wonderful leadership team in October to work with our clients to make a more inclusive, sustainable future for all.

A lot’s changed at Snook over the past few years. With the support of our parent company, NEC, we’ve grown and developed as a team, increasing our skills and expertise. We’ve built upon our legacy of being a world-class research and service design studio and grown into a full-service design agency, increasingly taking products and services from discovery through to live. 

Snook has grown quite quickly into a design agency with a headcount of over 100 people. Our client work ranges from massive central government projects to small charity projects with a huge social impact.

Whatever the scale and complexity of the project – design has always been at the heart of Snook’s work. The appointment of Bex and Jonny to the Chief Design Officer role shows our commitment to that. 

They join a strong leadership team, led by our Interim Managing Director Phee Kinnear, with Dr Valerie Carr leading our research team, Gavin Maguire as our head of service design, Natalie McFadyen managing new business and delivery and Tash Willcox leading our learning at Snook both internally and externally.

(Job) sharing is caring

Jonny and Bex are a husband and wife team. They first met when working together at a design agency and immediately realised that they complement each other perfectly. They do their best work together and will be joining us from the design studio, Reply, which Bex founded and where they both currently work together.

The job share approach is a perfect fit for Snook and a perfect fit for Jonny and Bex.

For us, it brings with it a depth and breadth of expertise that would be frankly impossible to find in a single individual. They have a strong commercial background too, with experience in the private sector, central and local government, as well as the charity sector.

It also demonstrates our commitment to inclusive recruitment. We want people to be able to balance their other commitments and interests with work.

For Jonny and Bex the job share appointment provides them with the flexibility they need for their family life and the ability to continue to work together.

Their successes individually have been significant in the industry and together they inspire, support and bring the best out of each other. 

They believe that designers have a responsibility to ensure that their work benefits society and has a positive social impact. Their most recent work has involved supporting survivors of gender-based violence, helping grant-makers publish their funding decisions openly, creating design solutions to ensure inhalers are more environmentally friendly, supporting a local government to understand their resident’s feelings around data privacy, and product design work to support medical professionals in war-torn regions.

Together they’ve been championing, and modelling, ethical design in the industry for years. They are co-founders of Tech for Good Live and Bex is one of the founders of the recently formed UK Tech for Good Network. 

Get in touch: curious@wearesnook.com or you can message Jonny directly at jonny.rae-evans@wearesnook.com