In our the first half of our first-ever two-parter, the legendary Jelly Helm sits down with Sean to talk about his early career design mistakes… as well as urinal content, slowly becoming the big gray bean cube, and the worst conversations you can have on a long flight. This is interesting to other people—we swear!

Since we recorded more than 3 hours together in studio, I broke our conversation in two to give you as much of the good stuff we talked about without needing to lose any of it. Listen in two weeks for part 2, where we’ll talk about his more recent career milestones including Wieden+Kennedy 12, Studio Jelly, and more. Subscribe wherever you get the show to hear that episode as soon as it drops!

Jelly Helm is a creative director, brand advisor, and educator based in Portland, Oregon. As founder of Studio Jelly, he provides thoughtful creative leadership and trusted brand partnership to organizations seeking to powerfully express who they are and what they are about.

Previously, Jelly served as Executive Creative Director at Wieden+Kennedy, Group Creative Director at The Martin Agency, and Creative Director at Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam. He was also founding faculty at VCU Brandcenter and founder/director of Wieden+Kennedy 12, the agency’s experimental in-house school.

This episode was recorded on Saturday, March 28, 2026 in the Rat’s Nest.