Lee Clow, father of Apple advertising steps down.

03 Nov 2009, Posted by Jason in current events / news,design, 2 Comments

Even if you don’t recognize his name or face, there is no question you are familiar with Lee Clow’s work. Today, he stepped down as CCO at TBWA, where for decades he put out some of the most iconic ads that everyone is familiar with: from the infamous and widely considered greatest commercial of all time, Apple’s “1984″, the “Think Different” campaign, the silhouette iPod commercials, the Mac vs PC commercials, the Energizer Bunny to the Taco Bell chihuahua.

Not even being a designer, I remember seeing the 1984 commercial for the first time in a business class and being completely wowed. The story is the ad only ran once, during the 1984 Super Bowl, Ridley Scott (Blade Runner, Alien, Gladiator, Black Hawk Down) directed it, and the world was introduced to the Apple Macintosh. His iPod commercials captured the product better than I could ever imagine, the Mac vs PC spots took a stab right to the heart of PC users everywhere, and the Energizer bunny is one of the longest brand ambassador’s I can think of.

As much as I like all the above, his “Think Different” campaign is my favorite. For anyone fortunate enough to be in New York, go to TekServe and you can see these all printed and framed in the store for yourself. For the rest of you, I’ll let some of the work speak for itself.