Lucy’s career began in advertising, as a copywriter in big agencies, (Lintas, DM&B); finally as Creative Director in a small one, (Gin Jeffery).
She worked on big accounts: Cadburys, Walls, Tesco and Rothmans – and small ones: Harrods, Mont Blanc and the Royal Academy. As a mum, she freelanced as a branding consultant, particularly on Persil’s Dirt is Good repositioning, which is still going strong.
Her writing now sometimes takes a different turn. She is a performance poet and a Grime lyricist.
It is the brevity, accuracy and clarity of her writing which enables her to move between such varying sectors. She loves copywriting. As someone said, “Give me the freedom of a tight brief”.
She was Poet in Residence for BBC Radio 2’s Jeremy Vine Show for four years. This involved writing/ broadcasting poems – at three hours’ notice – engaging with human significance often missing from the reporting of News and current affairs. Her decision to train for ministry was a result of realising, (from hundreds of her listeners’ emails), that she was voicing something helpfully meaningful.
Lucy worked as pastor to a poor, intercultural church in London’s East End amongst asylum seekers and homeless people. Among her other invitations, she is asked, annually, to preach and conduct prayers for Rwandans, (Tutsi and Hutu), as they remember the massacres. She is seen as a safe pair of hands, both by groups and by individuals. She has a small counselling practice.
Lucy and Carrie Pemberton Ford have worked together since 2007 when they met at C.H.A.S.T.E. This charity, founded by Carrie, informed, encouraged and supported churches in grasping the evil – and the evils – of sex trafficking. They co-produced two books for that purpose. Through Sincere Promise, they work on both secular and faith projects, to de-construct and reaffirm long-held-tenets.
Lucy is lone mother to a mixed-heritage son. She is a middle-class white, embedded amongst black youth. This, with her Judaic background, affords her a grasp of complex competing narratives.
The truth shall set us free. This applies as much to branding as to anything else. Resurrection can’t happen to a brand, a church, a soul, unless we relinquish much. Clarity and harmony then follow.
A longer, and more detailed CV is available on request.