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Billy Mawhinney, the Ammirati Puris Lintas senior art director, is

leaving the agency to join Ogilvy and Mather as a creative

director.

Mawhinney’s departure for Canary Wharf ends a successful 14-year

relationship with his copywriting partner, Nick Welch, who remains at

APL. Welch will announce a new partner shortly.

At O&M, Mawhinney, 45, will work alongside Leon Jaume, the creative

director on Ford, and with Patrick Collister, O&M’s executive creative

director, on non-Ford projects.

Collister said: ’I’m delighted to be able to offer our biggest and most

important client even more senior resource. At some stage, we will be

increasing the European role we play on Ford and Billy will be helping

with that. It’s also a testimonial to the creative renaissance we are

effecting at O&M that Billy should want to join us.’

Mawhinney commented: ’Nick and I have been together for an

eternity.

We had got used to finishing each other’s sentences, but it got a bit

worrying when we began starting them. We both needed a fresh

challenge.

I’m obviously very sorry to be leaving him, but we’re still the best of

friends.’

Andrew Cracknell, APL’s chairman and executive creative director, said:

’It is with enormous regret that Billy is leaving - he is a superb art

director and is also one of the nicest blokes you could find in a

business I have always thought is stuffed with terrific people.’

Mawhinney will take up his post at O&M in March.

He started out in 1978 as a trainee art director at JWT. He teamed up

with Welch in 1986 and, in 1989, they became JWT’s joint executive

creative directors.

They moved to Collett Dickenson Pearce in 1994 as creative directors,

were ousted a year later and joined APL, then S. P. Lintas, where they

worked on accounts such as Rover, Nestle and Vesta.

Mawhinney has won many awards, including a ±±¾©Èü³µpk10 gold for Persil and

a Cannes silver for KitKat.

He and Welch were responsible for the Rover 200 ’Englishman in New

York’ commercial.