In my creative career, I’ve been able to work as the illustrator, designer, creative director, and art director on numerous client projects via freelance and while at a creative agency. I’ve also been on the other side as the in-house creative leading a design team and working with agencies/freelancers on projects. Along the way, these experiences and my life experiences have helped shape and prepare me to keep creative and lead with empathy.

I absolutely LOVE leading a team and getting people excited about creating work that makes an impact. Outside of creating, mentoring and people managing has been one of my favorite things I’ve been able to do in my career.

Ever since I could pick up a marking utensil, I've been drawing and making in order to tell stories and express emotions. I am unabashedly me, which has fostered my growth and confidence in tackling challenges. I will be there to rally and cheer on the team from ideation to launch and everything in-between.

Quick EXPERIENCE Glance

Planoly: Director of Brand and Creative, Design Director, Design Manager, Senior Graphic Designer

Traject (Planoly’s Parent Company): Design Director

Good Good Good Co: Art Director for the Goodnewspaper

Primer Grey (Creative Studio): Graphic Designer

To Write Love on Her Arms: Summer Intern

Carra Sykes - Freelance Creative: Art Director, Creative Director, Designer, Illustrator

In August of 2020, I joined Planoly as the Senior Designer. Little did I know this small step into tech would be a huge step in my career as a creative leader. Shortly after I joined, Planoly was acquired. The CCO/Co-Founder who hired me (and took a huge chance on me) left and I was to lead the creative team as Design Manager.

Mentoring and managing the creative team was one of my fondest experiences at Planoly. We had full-time designers and a few contract designers. I’m grateful for the team I got to lead.

During my time at Planoly, I was lucky enough to gain more experience and perspective with cross-team collaboration (product, engineering, CS) while being a leader on the marketing team. I loved getting to provide feedback on the product and work with the product design team to bridge the marketing and product design experience for our users (and future users). I also go the experience of pitching to and building relationships with the Exec team.

Right before my time ended at Planoly, I led the in-house rebrand as Design Director. We had the challenge of rebranding and launching within 3 months (including designing and launching a new marketing site). I had a ton of fun working with the team on the copy/language and exploring copywriting. We got a lot of excited reactions from our audience and target audience. The project scope included: Strategy, Creative Direction, Logo Design, Brand Design, Web Design, Content Design, Motion Graphics, Copywriting, Launch and more.

After the rebrand, I was promoted to Director of Brand and Creative which added leading partnerships and events to my job description. I learned so much in my almost 4 years at Planoly and I’m ready to take that knowledge into my next position.

Marketing lead: Worked with our VP of Marketing to lead and guide the marketing team. Maintained a relationship with the Exec team to advocate for the creative and marketing teams.

Creative Ops: I built our creative intake process that was open to company-wide requests. This process focused on company prioritization and had company goals top of mind. Experience in Asana and Monday.com as task management tools.

Social Media Creative: Led all visual creative for our social media channels while working with our Social Media Manager and marketing team. Our most-used platform was Instagram where we had around 190k followers when I left.

A few awards while at Planoly (and Traject, the parent company): C.A.B.B.A.G.E. Award (Company-wide Core Values award for Traject) and Plantoly Award (Employee of the Month decided by the employees)

Brand Video/Commercial

Plan for Today. Build for Tomorrow: One of my favorite parts of working at Planoly was creating a product that would help people find a balance between work and life. Planoly gives them the tool to plan and get organized while saving them time to do what they love.

We hired the most fantastic agency, Fort Lion Studio based in Fort Worth, TX to help us tell the story of a fictional Planoly customer to help people see how the product could add value to their life. We worked together to build the story and they really made our vision come to life.

PUMA - TOGETHER FOREVER Campaign

Concept + Illustrations + Pattern Design + Apparel Creative

What a dream to work with PUMA on the Together Forever Pride collection benefiting GLAAD with Cara Delevingne. This project was started a year before it went live.

I worked on concept and artwork with the PUMA team which included: a concept pitch deck, visual ideation and sketches, brainstorming and collaboration with the team. We went through many stakeholders and spent a lot of time in thoughtful conversation on how to make the campaign impactful.

Beautiful photos by @laquanndawson.

GE - MOTHERS OF INVENTION

Art Direction + Photography

GE reached out to me and my wife (Lauren Marek) to photograph mothers who worked at the transportation facility in Fort Worth, TX. We created the style and direction for the shoot which was then used as inspiration for other marketing materials.

We aimed to capture the mothers in a way that embodied how powerful they are and how they support GE as a company. It was super inspiring and empowering to work with these women. The photos are all taken with the light within the work environment so that we could work on the fly and capture with a documentary feel. While on site we also shot a ton of images of the plant for GE.

Target - Spirit Day WITH GLAAD

Concept + Animation Direction + Illustration + Art Direction

I’ve been lucky enough to work with brands that align with what I believe. The team at GLAAD and Target allowed me to concept and illustrate three animated pieces that would live on social media for Spirit Day. Spirit Day is day of awareness and action to support LGBTQ youth and stand against bullying that happens every October.

I worked with the animation team at Target to produce the animations and prepped the artwork for them. We also created a Snapchat filter that was available for people to use in certain locations across the US.

“Carra Sykes is the real deal. She was super influential in the creative work on my team at Meta. As a contractor she jumped right in and immediately understood the brand, saving us invaluable time.

Her skills in illustration and synthesis of a brand’s core character and style are truly top tier. She’s got the kind of style that can’t be taught.”

- Emma (Meta)

“Whoever hires her will be incredibly lucky! Carra Sykes is one of the most talented and thoughtful people I've had the pleasure of working with.

In addition to being an incredible illustrator, designer, and creative director, she's also an outstanding leader, marketer, and problem solver. ”

- Branden (Good Good Good Co)

• I love being a mama to our two boys and a wife to my wife

• To keep off of the screen, I enjoy spending time sewing and making clothes

• I spend way too much time on YouTube watching tutorials, but it’s therapeutic to me

• I cry at commercials and most movies/tv shows

• I will act goofy in public to make my family laugh

• I played soccer in college for a short bit (D3 school)

• Singing brings me so much joy, but am not traditionally good at it

• I got a Peloton during Covid and it’s been so good for my mental and physical health

• I’m good at improvising while cooking, but terrible at baking