“There was a really interesting energy around in the mid to late 80s and there wasn’t anything you couldn’t do” says Vicki Maguire as she reflects on a career that by her own token has been “unconventional”. Now Chief Creative Officer at Grey London, Maguire confesses that she arrived at the agency 10 years ago from Wieden+Kennedy to do two weeks of freelance work and just never left.

Growing up in Leicester with her twin and two hard working parents, Maguire quickly discovered in sixth form that if she put all her free periods together, she could get Monday off. Ever the entrepreneur, she used that day to run a stall in Leicester market selling second hand clothing: “I learnt from a very early age how to make money”. She went on to study fashion design at the University of Northumberland but realised that “I could neither sew nor even draw”. It was Paul Smith, who was a mentor at the college, who told her to stop drawing and write down her ideas instead. He could have no idea what an impact that advice would have.

Having been fired from a myriad of design jobs - once “spectacularly” by Vivienne Westwood herself in a story that involves red mortician’s lipstick bought from her mate Julie’s dad, an undertaker, and an unfixable stain on a silk wedding dress - she realised that the boys at the young advertising agency next door, HHCL, were getting paid very well to sit and think up ideas. She was sold.

Her proudest moment to date, except “not getting fired”, has been her work for the British Heart Foundation, one year with Victoria Wood on the Angina Monologues which won a British Comedy Award, “a pinnacle”. Next came the now famous ad with Vinnie Jones, which would go on to scoop up most industry awards. She maintains she wasn’t interested in the accolades nor “the swagger surrounding it” but in the stories of the lives the ad saved. Like the art teacher who was saved in the wine aisle at Vicki’s mum’s local Tesco by a bearded man singing the Bee Gees Stayin’ Alive under his breath. As she said, “I can’t top that”.

After a brief stint in in Sydney in 2003 – “must’ve been a very early midlife crisis”– Maguire returned to London, recognising that it was the grit and tension of the city that pulled her back. Having lived in the East End for 25 years, “as soon as you step out, you’re smacked in the face with what’s going on,” Maguire missed riding the No 8 bus and writing in the early morning at Smithfield market; “I can’t work in an office. I don’t need quiet.”

Grey, for Maguire, has offered her every experience she could have wanted, “I’ve never done the same year twice”. She came for “the energy and the people and the opportunity” and “just stayed because it got interesting”.