This is me, mid-rehearsal for a talk in China, blissfully unaware I was already thirty feet tall and blinking on a giant screen.
How did I get here? Let’s rewind. I’ll tell it like it went down: quick, kind of a blur, made to be read at 1.5x, barely edited for clarity. Hang on.
Born in Santos, youngest of four, only boy, raised by a battalion of women who taught me to survive, negotiate, and spot emotional manipulation from across the room. School and I never really clicked—especially chemistry, where one teacher told my mom I was a lost cause, which is rich coming from a man whose main teaching method was yelling at periodic tables like they owed him money. I spent my teenage years in a band, screaming into microphones in front of crowds that ranged from mildly curious to surprisingly euphoric—always loud, sweaty, occasionally on the radio, often on questionable stages at church fairs and public squares. Dreamed of music, but starving in São Paulo didn’t seem that romantic. Chose advertising—a slightly more legal way to be creative and misunderstood. Started at 19, didn’t love the job but loved using the salary to fund better distractions. Moved to London to live some poorly scripted version of freedom, came back with zero cash, passport-less (long story) and one vintage coat. Back to copywriting, raised some money, quit again. Moved to New York, this time for film school and screenwriting. Realized dreams are expensive—especially in Manhattan. Came back again, slightly more humbled, and decided to get serious about advertising so I could afford to quit again someday. Worked at Santa Clara, Africa DDB, then JWT. Got called back to Africa DDB as a creative director at 29, which felt less like a promotion and more like being asked to build a spaceship out of IKEA parts—without instructions, and with everyone watching. By then, Ana was already in my life—and so was her daughter, Catarina, who promoted me to Dad without checking my LinkedIn. Took on Budweiser—wild client until we made it fun, and occasionally award-winning. Tagwords happened. Cannes Grand Prix. Had another kid, Nino, because why not add more plot to the story. Then I quit. Again. Went back to being a copywriter at Wieden+Kennedy Sao Paulo because I missed writing—and making decisions that confuse recruiters. Lasted three months before they asked me to remember how to be a CD to run Facebook Brazil. No one wanted Facebook. I did. I like clients who come with disclaimers. The work got good. It spread across the network. Covid hit. Everything paused, except the stress. Summer gave us (false) hope, so we packed up and moved to Italy for a few months—Ana had to claim her Italian citizenship and I wanted to legally eat three gelatos a day. Then, at the airport, boarding about to start, phone rings. Susan Hoffman. She says: “Wanna run Facebook Global with me?” And that’s the chapter break. There’s my life before Susan, and my life after Susan. Even my passport agrees.
Life after Susan deserved more care. But let’s speed up again, just to fit it all in. I spent a year partnered with the greatest creative in the world and, somehow, I relearned everything—how to see a director’s treatment from new angles, how to mess with Zoom filters mid-call, how to talk on the phone 27 times a day like I was thirteen again and grounded. Being Susan’s partner meant ending up in situations that made zero sense—like approving ideas pitched by Tony Davidson and Iain Tait, because, well, my partner was Susan Hoffman. Or discussing scripts with her while pacing the streets of Florence at midnight, alone, thanks to a delightful nine-hour time difference with Portland. Honestly, I would’ve done that job forever—Creative Directing one account with Susan felt strangely complete. But then came the plot twist: W+K and Facebook broke up. Two phone calls later—Susan to Karl, Karl to me—I was on my way to lead Heinz at Wieden+Kennedy New York. No time for ceremony. Just a new brief.
That was fun. Lasted four months. Did I mention plot twist? W+K decided to shift the leadership in São Paulo, and Karl called me back to lead the office. CCO at 34. The thing about running an office is that no one ever tells you how deep the water is until you’re already swimming. Spoiler: it was deep. Sink or swim, they say. Over the next three years, the current changed. I partnered with André Gustavo—who had built the place, left to run Nike Global in Portland, and returned just as I did—and together we found a way forward. We won pitches that raised some eyebrows: Google, Pepsi, Budweiser, among others. We didn’t just grow—we quadrupled the office’s revenue. We built a hub from scratch in Buenos Aires to better serve Argentina and Uruguay, with work that actually understood the region. Then we launched W+K Mexico—the network’s first Spanish-speaking office, and the first in W+K history to be profitable in its very first year. Sometimes the best chapters start mid-sentence.
It was mid-2023 when Karl called and asked if I wanted to run Wieden+Kennedy Portland. I said yes before seeing the offer, because some questions don’t need answers. Portland is still one of the few places where this industry believes its own mythology. I think the magic’s in the concrete. I landed in January 2024, but had already been knee-deep in emails with Susan since October. She left for Amsterdam as I arrived. The duo didn’t have a second act. Met Jim Riswold, who started calling me "my most Latin friend.”. That was nuts. The first question he asked me was, "Top three W+K commercials—go." I almost melted. At the office, with Azsa, Jason and Andy, we won the global Netflix account and picked up projects for Amazon Alexa, WNBA, NBA2K. We reshaped our client roster—and what we want to do with it. Reconnected with some classics. Redefined others. Increased the projected revenue for 2024 by 14%. A year later, we were named Adweek’s Creative Agency of the Year, which says something about the work, the people, the momentum. But mostly about this place. Still loud. Still weird. For all the success here, I blame the concrete.