Ladies, Wine, Design: unity is power

Sometimes women can become their worst enemies. Jessica Walsh, one of the most recognised graphic designers worldwide, experienced this hatred in her own flesh when she realised that the majority of criticisms towards her work and person came from women.

This realisation led her to found the Ladies, Wine & Design (LW&D) initiative in 2016, a series of meetings around the world for women and non-binary creatives to learn, grow and support each other in a safe space where they can connect with other women in the sector, with the aim of seeing more women leaders, entrepreneurs and creative managers.

It all started from another creative project by the designer, famous not only for her genuine use of vivid colours and web typography but also for her commitment to social causes such as mental health. In 12 Kinds of Kindness, a personal project in collaboration with the designer and illustrator Timothy Goodman to practice empathy and kindness with their surroundings, Walsh shared how she decided to approach her most outspoken critic amicably, and this act neutralised her aversion and propelled her to create LW&D as a platform to strengthen ties between creative women, create mentoring opportunities and address gender imbalance.

Gender equality is the 5th point of the 17 goals identified by the United Nations Organization in 2015 in its 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Nevertheless, the percentage of women and non-binary creatives in management positions as of 2020 is still very low.

According to Mujeres Creativas, a platform that champions visibility and equal opportunities for female talent in Spain, only 14% of the management positions in the creative sector are held by women but the majority of people who graduate in advertising are women. Creative Equals, an organization founded to promote gender equality in the creative sector in the United Kingdom shares similar data: there are only 16% of women in management positions in the creative sector, while in junior positions women represent 60% of the workforce.

Some time ago we talked about these inequalities in the architecture sector, and today we explore how the graphic design and visual communication sector is facing the problem with initiatives such as Ladies, Wine & Design. We have spoken with Paloma Ávila, a member of the FAD and a member of the ADG-FAD board in Madrid, founder and creative director of the Half&Twice design studio and promoter of the Ladies Wine Design events in Madrid.

How did you get involved in the LW&D project?

The truth is that the decision to start organizing Ladies, Wine & Design in Madrid was more the result of an impulse than something premeditated. In fact, I had no experience in organizing events, but it seemed such an interesting initiative that I did not want to miss the opportunity to join and learn from it. As a follower of Jessica Walsh and her work, I have always admired that social and contextual part that she always contributes to the personal projects she develops.

Jessica launched the LW&D NY edition and on her Facebook launched a call inviting other cities to join. I didn’t hesitate for a second to get in touch with her and offer myself to run the events in Madrid. Logistics weren’t very polished yet, but I’m glad to have been one of the first cities that joined the movement. Now there are more than 280 cities in the world.

The experience has been an enriching path at all levels. It has allowed me to better understand feminism, be part of the change and create a community of creative women in Madrid.

In 2018 I also had the opportunity to attend an international Ladies, Wine & Design event that was organized in Frankfurt with Jessica Walsh to bring together the ambassadors of the initiative worldwide. It was a very positive experience where we could share our doubts and get tips to improve.

How did you live the first meeting, both personally and by the feedback received?

In the first meeting I was super nervous. I had no idea of ​​organizing events, or speaking in public, nor had I done anything similar before. But I understood it as something I had to work with overtime and evolve. The truth is that I had such a good time and the feedback was so positive that it gave me the energy to continue. Attendees especially commented on the need for these types of initiatives that would allow us to meet and talk about the profession to help us balance that scale of inequality we live.

How have you seen the project evolve since the first meeting?

The Madrid the events have been held since 2016, and we do about 8-9 a year. The evolution has been amazing, especially for the amount of support we have been receiving through volunteers who have joined the project to help me, as with the sponsors who provide us with printed material, wine or catering. This has allowed the project to be developed with hardly any financial outlay, which also facilitates the situation. I have also seen a great growth of the community and in general, I notice that the initiative is getting more popular and has had an impact in the sector.

When will the next event take place?

We are currently preparing the 2020 program, which we hope to announce very soon through our website and on our social networks (IG and FB). We try to offer a varied program of activities that usually revolve around a specific topic: entrepreneurship, creative processes, social networks, print production, portfolio reviews, project management… There are some issues that have worked very well throughout the years and that’s why we keep repeating them in almost all editions, but we also try to innovate with new proposals, and above all listen to the feedback of the ladies to innovate and offer something that is useful to them.

In Spain, LW&D is organized in different places of the peninsula such as Coruña, Asturias, Santander, Bilbao, Zaragoza, Balaguer, Barcelona, Madrid, Extremadura, Valencia, Ibiza, Mallorca, Alicante, Murcia and Andalusia, but they are organized worldwide.

Isabel Roldán, a graphic designer based in London enthusiastically recalls her first experience at a LW&D meeting in the British capital: “It is a fantastic opportunity to meet other women in the sector, especially in a city as big, frantic and competitive as London. Also, in the group of designers that organize it, there are profiles from different fields of design and with very interesting career paths and they always make sure that there are opportunities to make connections between attendees and share experiences in a very fluid, natural and selfless way. It is difficult to define, but the atmosphere is much more relaxed than in other design events where opportunities to connect with people feel more forced and corporate. It is really a very healthy and welcoming community, and that is much appreciated in a city so atomized”.

Luckily, initiatives similar to LW&D are multiplying in other areas. In Barcelona, the AllWomen.tech initiative, a women’s education platform in the technology sector, also wants to deal with the terrible statistics of the sector: only 1 in 5 technological jobs are occupied by women and that has to change.

You can follow the upcoming LW&D events here or by following the pages of each of their local editions.

Text: Sol Polo