We caught up with Edwards of business agency GALE, who is the inaugural jury president for D&AD’s new Cultural Influence category, to find out what he’ll be looking for in award-winning work.
Every year at D&AD, we review our award categories to ensure they accurately reflect what is important in the global creative industries. For 2026, we’ve introduced a new Cultural Influence category to recognize commercial creativity that leaves a cultural footprint – work that sparks conversations, shapes identity, and becomes integrated into cultural life. Geoff Edwards, managing director, creative at GALE, will be presiding over a jury made up of creatives from around the world who will come together in London next May to answer a question pertinent to our times: what is the best work of the year that has demonstrated true cultural relevance and influence? We asked Edwards about the new category.
D&AD: What does cultural influence mean to you?
Edwards: I think cultural influence is creativity that truly impacts the culture at large for a brand. But I’ll tell you what it’s not – it’s not just about adding an actor or an influencer to an ad and calling it a day. We’re looking for work that’s indistinguishable from the things that we see in culture, seek out, and share.
D&AD: What are you going to be looking out for in winning work in this category?
Edwards: I want to feel jealous. I want to see work that the jury and I find surprising. I want to see work that connects to culture in an authentic way. I want work that adds value to the client’s business and that delivers a result. I think that measuring that result is going to be where we have the most challenge with this category.
D&AD: How do you measure if work has delivered a result?
Edwards: Well, this is the wonderful ambiguity of this category. It’s rooted in culture, and culture is ever-changing. I like to say that culture is like slang: the minute you start to understand it and say it, it’s changed. So it’s going to be difficult to measure what was the KPI for this work when it went out in the world. Was it awareness? Was it financial results? Was it brand advocacy? Cultural work can be measured on a variety of things.
D&AD: Is there anything else you’d like people to know about the category before they enter?
Edwards: Yes, two things. I hope that people use this as a litmus test to identify what is truly a cultural piece of work. Things across entertainment, music, sports, fashion, and gaming – they’re all alive. So it’s going to be incumbent on us to really clearly define cultural influence… so that people make their best choices when they’re submitting work.
The second is that D&AD is an incredible elite showcase, and I’m really looking forward to being in a room with jurors from around the world. That adds yet another layer of complexity, because looking at a cultural piece of work from a part of the world that we’ve never been to before, or maybe we don’t fully understand what that culture is, adds an entirely different layer. We’ll need the jury to act as translators in the room to be able to tell us what the thing about that piece of work that made it cultural at this point in time was, and why that’s something we should award. It’s going to be incredibly exciting to hear their points of view and help guide this new category.
D&AD: Absolutely. The Cultural Influence category is a category for which it’s hugely impactful to know what the influence has been – and you often can’t know, unless you’re part of that culture.
Edwards: That's exactly it. Here’s a scenario: can you imagine that we’re sitting in a room and there’s a piece of work, and you say: “I don’t get it,” and then you move on? Then there’s often someone quiet in the room, and you know the work has come from their region. And then you say: “Can you do me a favor? Can you please talk a little bit about this?” They then bring a perspective to the work that you hadn’t imagined before, and it forces you to look at the work differently. I’ve seen that kind of work come out and be awarded best in show at the end of the day. I’m not saying it’ll happen this time, but I think that being open to hearing about what makes work cultural in those areas is going to be a lot of fun.
D&AD: We’re excited to see what people enter into this category. It’s such a learning moment to see what’s been put forward because it opens your eyes to different cultures, the way people work in different countries, and different crafts.
Edwards: My hope is that what does win is something that is indistinguishable from culture itself. So it’ll be something that you see that you go: “Oh my God, I saw that!” or: “I love that piece of work!” or: “I never thought about that being submitted to D&AD!” I want something like that, versus the witchcraft of someone submitting an ad or an ad campaign and thinking that, because there’s a celebrity in it, that it is a cultural piece of work. No, we want something that is rooted in, inspired by, and indistinguishable from the culture of things that we not only love to watch but also love to share with our friends.
D&AD Awards 2026 is now open for entries. Enter the Cultural Influence category here.
