Today we’d like to introduce you to Nourhan Wahdan.
Hi Nourhan, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Born in 1993 in Cairo, Egypt, and raised there for 28 years of my life I definitely did not see myself landing here 22 hours away from home in the city of Angels. It all started back in 2011 when I decided to turn my video game obsessions and fanart into a career and majored in Graphic Design at the German University in Cairo and Berlin.
As a highest honors Applied Arts graduate, it seemed my path was laid out to be your typical “agency promotional ladder” path. Little did I know that seven years later I’d find myself running one of the leading branding bureaus in the MENA region, Pew Design LLC (pewdesign.com) – which I also co-founded.
Of course, that required a couple (or dozens) of sleepless nights, but it mostly required persistence and belief in the core values of design.
At first, I had to go through shamelessly giving out business cards in coffee shops, but in one year I found myself leading teams with clients like Google, Youtube, VICE and Unilever. I helped startups strategize, corporate reposition and painstakingly made sure every client walked away knowing that their brand is not their logo. Yes, moments like seeing my work light up Burj Khalifa when Swvl, a start-up that trusted us with creating their brand strategy & identity, went public with a $1.5 billion valuation, or Google’s Regional Director, Lino Cattaruzzi, telling us we did the best experiential YouTube event he ever commissioned are definitely an invaluable source of pride.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Oh, it was not. Besides the exhaustive visa process of getting here from Cairo that took 7 months, moving away to a new city that was a 21-hour flight with literally no one was harder than I had anticipated.
First of all, having to fly back and forth to Cairo to meet with my team and present to my Dubai clients, it was not easy to re-adjust my biological clock every time. And of course, my social life took a huge hit, my best friends were willing to keep me company at 4 AM their time but I needed more than just facetime, so I had to actively and literally “put myself” out there, I have a lot of friends in LA now but those first 3 months were tough and lonely.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
pew. started off as a design duo by its current founders, Nourhan and Al Hassan. We shook Cairo’s local market by introducing a truly subversive, unique approach & look. Within a year’s time, our work’s magnitude echoed back to find ourselves having worked with household brand names like YouTube, Google, Tabby & Swvl. We’ve both held senior designer positions at reputable agencies and have worked with a large & heterogeneous clientele body prior to pew.
We’ve both started pew. in January of 2017 to genuinely commit to the design process, and are continuously developing it through a profound research core and hands-on experimentation. Backing our unorthodox ways with cemented industry experience ultimately delivered, and still does, the most unforgettable design solutions.
In 2018, pew. expanded its team with collaborators that were carefully vetted to have the same drive and vision, which allowed pew. to expand and create bigger, more holistic experiences. pew. is now one of the leading design & branding studios, and the only one of its kind, in the MENA region, and is steadily growing a global client base.
We do the full range of graphic design services; from logo design & branding to experiential marketing and temporary architecture and special designs.
What does success mean to you?
For me, it’s about being content. Albeit cliche sounding, I feel the happiest when I’m satisfied with the work I do, fulfilled with how it can serve my community, and feel blessed by the precious people I got to meet along the way, and end up becoming friends, mentors, or family.
Pricing:
- $20,000 – $65,000/branding project
- $5,000 – $8,000/consultancy
- $7,500 – $15,000/monthly retainer
- TBD Speaking/Workshops
Contact Info:
- Website: pewdesign.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/nu___uh/
- Facebook: instagram.com/pew.db/
- Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/nourhanwahdan
- Other: be.net/nourhanwahdan
Image Credits
Design Camp Photo; Marshall Fenty
