Hi. I am Dany Babette, creative director and green card holder from Germany based in Brooklyn, New York.

Listing work experience and tiny men in shining silver (ever seen a female trophy? Angels don’t count!) doesn’t really tell you much about a person. So, let me share some little weird facts about myself: 

I could kill for tomato sauce, but hate tomatoes. Cats are my people. Dog people are not. I had my first ever fast food burger in 2020 and celebrated the glorious moment by re-enacting Andy Warhol devouring a hamburger from 66 Scenes from America (1982). I started writing poetry when I was 7. It was bad. Whenever I am on the beach, I can’t stop staring at the ocean. As the waves reach for me, I internally chant “phone home”. I am an octopus on the inside.

Komorebi (Japanese for sunlight filtering through the trees) is cardio for my soul and dark techno is oxygen to my heart. I know sun worship is basically your skin chain smoking, but I love roasting like a chicken in an air fryer. I feel intensely, and fearlessly. I carry my heart on my sleeve right there for anyone to squash with their bare hands. A balloon animal in a world of spikes. 

My parents were good eggs, but oddly shaped ones that didn’t quite fit into any box. My mother was a Penthouse model and actress who hosted the European song contest on roller skates back when perms were en vogue. Later in life, she ran a brothel with a flickering neon sign of a naked lady in the suburbs. She thought that made her a “cool mom”. I did not. My dad was a film director who shot epic adventure sagas on real pirate ships in the Caribbean, and niche 1970’s German erotica films who had been publicly praised by Tarantino for his movie “Julia”, and my brother was nominated for an Academy Award. Storytelling is in my DNA – but I never wanted to be daughter or sister to a famous man. I wanted to be a famous man. So, I went into advertising.

I started my career at Jung von Matt, where I spearheaded ‘The Most German Supermarket’ – Germany’s most awarded campaign of 2018. I went on to work for BBDO Berlin, and 360i, Droga5 and Grey in New York where I produced nationwide campaigns for the two biggest media stages in advertising: Pringles’ 2022 Super Bowl spot directed by Tom Kuntz & a March Madness campaign for Invesco directed by SNL’s Adriana Robles. Since then I’ve been freelancing for some of the world’s top agencies including Droga5, Johannes Leonardo, Adam & Eve, Giant Spoon, Red Antler, McCann, Martin, Mojo Supermarket, ATTN, and many more. 

Whenever I don’t make ads, you’ll find me volunteering for the Domestic Violence Project at the Urban Justice Center, writing (now slightly less terrible) poems and feminist essays, journaling in Fort Greene Park, or bending like a pretzel on a yoga mat surrounded by energy vortexes in Sedona.