After the Airbnb It campaign, Airbnb returned to BUCK with a new set of scripts, this time centering on what Airbnbs can do that hotels can't. We pushed further in every direction — more cinematic camera work, richer 3D rendering, longer-format storytelling — and with it, raised the bar we'd set with the original Airbnb It campaign.

The central design challenge was creating contrast that felt true rather than exaggerated. Hotel spaces had to read as generic without becoming caricature; Airbnbs had to feel specific and lived-in without tipping into fantasy. Across props, lighting, spatial composition, color, and character design, every decision was calibrated to that tension. The characters functioned as audience surrogates, so their relatability was load-bearing — if you didn't see yourself in them, the stakes of the whole story collapsed.

As design director, I led the visual development of the campaign end to end, shaping the look and feel across every element that put these worlds on screen. The campaign ran across digital, OTT, social, and YouTube in the U.S., Canada, UK, Europe, and Latin America, accumulating over 90 million views on YouTube and counting. It has since been added to the STASH 168 permanent collection.

I spoke about this campaign and its influences with It's Nice That here.