Leilani Horthy Banks’ Creative LIAisons Diary: Fear and loathing (and learning) in Las Vegas
Leilani Horthy Banks, Junior Art Director, Clemenger BBDO, Sydney (formerly DDB Australia) ~ current CB Australian 2025 Agency of the Year ~ is representing Australia at the 2026 Creative LIAisons program in Las Vegas, featuring some of the world’s most respected creative directors as speakers. Here, Leilani reports exclusively for Campaign Brief.
Vegas, Day 1, 11:49pm.
It’s 11 minutes to midnight, I’m 38 hours into my first ever trip to Las Vegas, and my suitcase looks like a mobile police narcotics lab… if the police dealt almost exclusively in stationary that is.
I have three Artline pens, one and a half notebooks, five semi-blunt lead pencils, no pencil sharpener, one eraser, two laptops, one pair of running shoes, an assortment of collared shirts, skirts and sequins (after all, it’s Vegas…) … plus around twenty-five loose sheets of notes scrawled on various bits of hotel stationary, and the miniature pen that had done the scrawling, after forgetting to actually bring any of the aforementioned stationary along to the conference sessions. And also three paperback novels (one of which, if you have not already guessed, is a half-read copy of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas).
Fortunately, this is not a Hunter S. Thompson novel, and my brain is fueled not with a cacophony of amphetamines but on the thrill of a day spent amongst brilliant young minds. Plus a little jetlag. And a touch of tequila. But definitely mostly probably just the thrill of learning and discussing and debating and contemplating the insane and all-consuming thing that is creativity. Hunter eat your heart out.
If my notes are anything to go by, there was much to be learned. Matt Murphy told us to see the apple 100 different ways. To be the most curious, and to try new things to trick yourself into an unlock. Apparently marble carving is a good place to start.
Shelley Smoler said to not wait for luck, but to give ourselves more opportunities for luck to find us. And to never stay in our lane. Ali Rez talked of doing the legwork, of figuring out how to do the thing and putting in the extra effort to get it done. Aaron Starkman mostly just plugged Rethink, and his new hotline 1800 C.R.A.F.T.S. (is the idea Clear, Relevant, Achievable, Fresh, True and Shareable), visit the Rethink website to learn more for only $1.99.
But seriously, much like the sprawling mass of glittering lights and dizzying sites below my hotel window – shout out to the beautiful Treasure Island hotel – it was a truly wild and wonderful day. And so the last little nugget I’ll leave you with is to ‘be unreasonable’, courtesy of Rob Galluzzo. He said other great things, as did many other brilliant and inspiring people, but that one stuck with me most. I think, right now, at this present moment in my career, it is just what I needed to hear.
That is all for now. To the bar fridge I go.
“You’re so money and you don’t even know it”
Vegas, Day 3 (or is it 4?), 03:17am.
There comes a moment on every Vegas work trip – this being my first – when you have to look yourself up and down in the hotel mirror, straighten your LIA conference lanyard, slam two ibuprofen and remember one thing:
You’re so money and you don’t even know it.
At least that is what I’ll be telling myself tomorrow, or rather today, when in a few short hours I have to haul ass out of bed, rally my overstimulated mind and sleep-deprived body, and front up to another day surrounded by some of the sharpest minds in the biz. All while slot machines ping off in the background,
Crown Casino wishes she could be this baller.
For now my mind is reeling. The past two days have been filled with the heady joy of listening to people who, at the height of their careers, are still filled with passion and inspiration and hope for our industry. We heard from CCOs as they delivered shrewd advice – some of which was about believing how money you are, though in perhaps a few more words.
Marjorieth Sanmartin phrased it as ‘You’re better than you think you are’, and told us to not be embarrassed or afraid of taking ownership of our work, our opinions, our actions and, perhaps most importantly, our weirdness. Advice that, as someone constantly being eaten by self doubt — a trait I think a fair few of my fellow mentees share — served as a welcome (gin &) tonic to those niggling anxieties.
Magnus Jakobsson put it a little more bluntly – be the freakiest person in the room. This is also what I’ll be telling myself in the mirror tomorrow morning.
We learned to be resilient, to embrace imperfection, to protect the idea and know when to fall on our sword, to learn how the money is made and where the bodies are buried. To focus on the things we can control, and forget about the things we can’t. And to get therapy. If nothing else, it’ll help you understand how people think, so you can sell to them more effectively. You can credit Jeff Benjamin for that sage piece of advice. We really are an industry of psychos and I’m so here for it.
We also got the chance to judge the work, and boy did we judge. The most important lesson? Five little words: ‘I love the work, but…’ (I actually really truly did love the work though, I swear).
And we heard from a true legend of the industry, Susan Credle, whose passion and fervour and hope for the future of creativity infused us all with the sort of buoyant positivity that makes you feel like your feet aren’t quite touching the floor. On a side note Nevada is a state where marijuana is legalised but I’m sure the two things aren’t connected.
And with that we floated out of the room and off to the dance floor, because when you’re in Vegas and someone offers you free tickets to Steve Aoki, you say hell yes and dance until your toes fall off.
We’re gonna be up five hundy by midnight.
Vegas, baby. Vegas!
(All credits to Charity Chen for literally capturing the rainbow. So money.)
The one woman wolf pack grows by 127
Vegas, Day 6-ish, 5:53pm.
I’m sprawled across three seats at Gate D53 at Las Vegas Airport, surrounded by suitcases and souvenirs and all the various bits of hotel stationery that I’ve scrawled and scribbled on over this past week (refer to Day 1 for more context). Beyond the airport windows, the lumbering white bodies of jumbo jets glow orange and pink under the slowly setting rays of desert sun. It is, in case you haven’t already guessed, the very end of my last day in Vegas.
And well, I’d like to say something that I’ve prepared. Tonight. I never got the chance to say it in person, so I guess this will do. Ahem.
Hello. How about that ride in? Fourteen hours of hell… I guess that’s why they call it Sin City. Ha ha.
You guys might not know this, but I consider myself a bit of a loner. I tend to think of myself as a one woman wolf pack. But back in 2024, when I found my creative partner, Nick Warrand, I knew I’d found one of my own. And my wolf pack, it grew by one.
So there were, there were two of us in the wolf pack. I was alone first in the pack, and then Nick joined in later. And six days ago, when I landed in Vegas for LIA and met all the other Creative LIAisons, I thought, “wait a second, could it be?”
And now I know for sure, I just added a hundred and twenty-seven more sick-ass creatives to my wolf pack. All of us wolves, running around the desert together, in Las Vegas, looking for strippers and cocai— I mean no, uhh, not that part. How about looking for advice and inspiration… yeah, yeah that sounds better. Let’s go with that.
In true Hangover fashion, I don’t quite remember it all. But I do remember tucking myself into the corner of the ‘Production & Post and Music Video’ jury room , listening as jurors debated the merits of the work and the craft and what makes it award worthy – or not. We saw firsthand how judging has a power all on its own, to send a message and help shape the future of our industry. And we witnessed that in effect as a Grand LIA was awarded to the work that best embodied what we believed great craft should mean – a simple idea, clearly, cleverly, and beautifully communicated. Did we sway the jury? Maybe. But only slightly, I swear.
I remember a night among the fallen neon icons of old Vegas, lit by the brightly-hued signs of last century, as we sipped champagne and cocktails and ate tiny pieces of food and mingled with icons of the industry. All trying very desperately to sound intelligent and insightful and keep foot-out-of-mouth. “Netflirting”, as my copywriter Nick likes to call it.
All too shortly followed by speedwalking down the boulevard the next morning, heart pounding and head throbbing and hazy images of after — dimly lit clubs, dance floors and definitely putting said-foot-in-said-mouth — flashing through my mind. At least I wasn’t the wildest one on the dance floor. If my less than perfect memory serves correctly, I do believe a few of the jurors can claim that prize.
And I remember our last day soaking up the wisdom of even more inspiring people, as they talked about the importance of building your tree of influence, of unplugging and taking breaks (to watch trash TV for two hours), the power of play, and getting out of advertising to go back to advertising.
Thank god I wrote notes. I can’t decipher most of them, but here’s the best of what I can:
“Trying to convince a client who doesn’t buy good work to buy good work is like trying to convince a vegetarian to eat meat. You have to start with turkey, not choripan.”
– Pancho Cassis
“Don’t do it.”
– Kwame Taylor-Hayford, about starting an indie.
“There is no right time to do anything in life. I think you just have to take the step when you’re ready. You’ve just got to do it in spite of the fear.”
– also Kwame about starting an indie.
“They’re not really your values unless they cost you something.”
– Jyrki Poutanen, about balancing your values with your career.
“Sometimes having a bit of hate is not a bad thing. It’s about what you do with it.”
– Lewis Tutssel
“Fear is a hugely humbling, learning emotion. And fear makes you want to try harder, makes you want to learn more, makes you want to read more. So be fearful. I’m terrified 24/7. It’s good.”
– Tista Sen
All followed by the only natural way to ever finish off a week long work trip in Vegas… starring as an extra in a music video, of course. Because when you’re sitting next to someone in a jury room, and they tell you about their music video they’re filming in a tiny wedding chapel on Friday on the outskirts of the city, you most definitely have to offer your services. And the services of the guy sitting next to you. Don’t worry Pico, the marriage wasn’t legally binding. I think.
My chest hurts. I’m pretty sure it’s the opening strains of some deep-seated chest infection beginning to take root. Probably courtesy of all the cigarette smoke, noxious casino perfumes and dusty desert air I’ve been sucking into my lungs these past six days. Definitely nothing to do with the fact that I’m leaving behind some of the coolest, weirdest, wildest and just plain freaking nice people I’ve ever met. Don’t start crying, Alan.
Editor’s note: Leilani’s wolf pack speech is borrowed from Alan’s rooftop toast in The Hangover.