The most awarded copywriters of all time

D&AD have kindly compiled a list for us.

And here are the art directors.

Interesting lists, in that they feature quite a few retired people, and that’s despite the fact that with the recent proliferation of categories it is now much easier to win more pencils.

Oddly enough, the Craig Allen/Eric Kallman inclusion is the only evidence of this.

It seems that these days it’s either harder to put a run of many excellent years together, or people are leaving the industry sooner. I understand that John Webster (on both lists, the bastard) had a longer time to put a run in, but I don’t think he featured in an annual in the last ten years.

Another interesting trend would be the bias towards TV. TV ads entered in D&AD have always had the chance to win more pencils because their craft categories number far more than those for printed work (the Art Direction category only began in 1996).

I’d like to see another list separated into print and motion picture. I’m not suggested Craig Allen is any less of a print AD than, say, Dave Dye or Paul Belford, or that Tom Carty is any better or worse at writing than, say, Nigel Roberts or Indra Sinha, but I’d be interested to know who won the most awards for writing and art direction, not just who created one TV ad whose Pencils came partly via the skills of others.

Of course, the job of Art Director encompasses all these aspects, so this list is no more or less valid than what I’m suggesting, but there’s more than one way to skin a cat, and lists are there to be argued over.

Another list: 7/20 of those in the above lists worked at AMV, 6/20 worked at BBH, 5/20 worked at CDP, 3/20 worked at BMP/DDB (I’m counting Webster twice), 2/20 worked at Saatchis, 2/20 worked at HHCL, 2/20 worked at W&K.

Update: more D&AD all-time lists here.