Art Direction
Messaging Strategy
Project Management
Video Production
Librarians are among America's most trusted public servants, yet their impact is often reduced to books and quiet spaces. In reality, they serve as educators, technologists, advocates, and community connectors, helping people navigate everything from healthcare and education to economic opportunity. At a time when libraries and librarians are facing heightened political scrutiny, funding pressures, and growing public debate about their role in society, there was an opportunity to elevate the broader narrative around libraries and librarians by revealing the profound and often unseen ways librarians strengthen communities across America.
Working with the American Library Association, the challenge was to transform the I Love My Librarian Award from an annual recognition program into a broader storytelling campaign, one that highlighted the essential role public institutions like libraries play in everyday civic life.
Through stories spanning rural, suburban, and urban communities, For the Love of Librarians demonstrated that, more than book keepers, librarians have increasingly become first-responders to some of the biggest problems faced by local communities. They help stabilize displaced families, expand access to government resources, preserve cultural heritage, support youth, and create pathways to opportunity and belonging for new immigrants. For the Love of Librarians is a love letter to these public servants who thread the fabric of American society.
I developed the campaign identity and strategy, commissioned an Oscar-winning to produce short documentaries, and led project management for For the Love of Librarians, a storytelling platform built around the lives of ten recipients of the I Love My Librarian Award. Through powerful photo and video storytelling, the project revealed the often unseen ways librarians are building stronger, more resilient communities.
To extend the campaign beyond the awards program, I developed a cinematic visual language that reimagined librarians as everyday heroes. Inspired by movie posters and character-driven photography, the portraits celebrated the extraordinary impact of ordinary public servants, forming the foundation of a social-first campaign created with the American Library Association and Carnegie Corporation of New York.
The campaign was designed as a scalable storytelling platform, spanning a 13-part short-form social series, 3 short documentaries, and concepts for out-of-home and community activations, including bookmarks and special edition library cards at each featured librarian's library.
To expand the campaign beyond editorial storytelling, I conceived and produced a three-part documentary series spotlighting librarians transforming communities across the country. In partnership with Academy Award-winning production studio Smartypants Pictures, the films followed a mobile librarian serving Maui communities after devastating wildfires, a West Virginia librarian helping immigrant students find belonging through books in their native languages, and a librarian in a Delaware youth detention facility using literacy to create hope and opportunity.
Rather than relying on a traditional documentary format, we combined remote interviews with personal photographs from librarians and community members to create intimate, community-driven stories. As producer, I toggled between strategy and execution, shaping story development, interview direction, and executing all the campaign's assets.
The campaign demonstrated how storytelling can expand the value of an existing program beyond recognition and into long-term advocacy. Rather than creating a campaign that ended with the awards, it established a communications framework capable of elevating an entire profession through human-centered stories year-round.
Anna Rowe, Executive Producer, Smartypants Pictures
Eric Nichols, Creative Director
Amy , Production Manager
Catriona Whalley, Social Dissemination Strategy
Wilfred Chan, Editorial and Copy
Angely Montilla, Project Management Support