The announcement comes at the closing of this year’s New Blood Festival which took place from 5-8 July. This year’s festival took place digitally again and offered talks and insights for attendees.

Emerging creatives were invited to respond to a series of briefs set by leading global brands and agencies. The briefs covered a wide-range of disciplines, including: advertising, branding, typography, experiential, illustration and game design. The briefs were designed to provide new talent the experience of working on client briefs that tackled varying current commercial challenges and social issues.

186 Pencils were awarded for outstanding work, including three Black Pencils, the most prestigious creative accolade, and six White Pencils for outstanding work that uses the power of creativity to do good. D&AD also awarded 28 Yellow, 45 Graphite and 104 Wood Pencils in recognition of the exceptional creative responses to these briefs.

Black Pencil winners

Both a Black and White Pencil were awarded to The Black List, an entry in response to the Penguin brief. Reading plays a pivotal part in developing young people and 40% of GCSE students state that they can’t find anything of interest to read. Gareth C E, Jack Walsh and Osagie Samuel from the School of Communication Arts 2.0 created a campaign that aims to persuade the UK government to change the curriculum. By spotlighting under-represented, marginalised and more relatable voices within writing, The Black List movement hopes to reposition writing in a more authentic way and help young people understand that consuming words and stories can empower their own voice.

Watch: The Black List

Lit on Beat was also awarded a Black Pencil in response to Penguin’s brief. Selina Smyllie of Leeds Arts University created a campaign that aims to help Black teenagers - especially those with dyslexia - who feel disconnected from the written word. The campaign aligns the worlds of rap and poetry in order to highlight the similarities between the two, helping to push for curriculums across the country to recognise this commonality and help those struggling with connecting to the written word.

Watch: Lit on Beat

The final Black Pencil was awarded to The You Tour, a response to the 21Grams brief, which looks to raise awareness about melanoma among young people of colour by leveraging the expansion of the Black travel movement. Reframing the body as a landscape of must-see places, Pernille Lund and Jonathan Fjord of DMJX - Danish School of Media and Journalism, aim to transform a curiosity for travel into a catalyst that helps people to recognise the signs of melanoma and have it diagnosed as early as possible.

Watch: The You Tour

Whilst unable to accept their awards in person this year, the winners of this year’s awards will be celebrated during the New Blood Awards digital ceremony on 8 July.

New Blood Quickfire brief

The festival gave young creatives the opportunity to participate in a live briefing from IBM for the latest D&AD New Blood Quickfire brief. Launched in response to the pandemic, the Quickfire briefs are aimed at recent graduates, emerging creatives and students looking to continue their learning, develop their portfolio and find paid opportunities.

The short, six week briefs with accompanying short courses aim to provide more flexible opportunities to emerging talent to impress industry leaders. IBM’s brief focuses on sustainability and offers prospective creatives an exciting opportunity to land themselves a role at IBM and to have their submission turned into a real life project.

For more information on the brief and how to apply go here.

For information on all the Pencil winning entries, go here.