Getting to Know… Moah Studio

Moah Studio is a creative studio shaping the paths brands take next. Founded by award-winning leaders from Jam3 and .Monks, Moah blends strategic creativity with data-led craft to build brand systems, digital products, and interactive experiences that scale. Moah is built on radical transparency, founder access, and a distributed model designed for today’s world: smaller teams, smarter execution.

Moah Studio co-founder Dirk van Ginkel spoke with LBB about building his own studio without the baggage, inviting clients into their creative process, and views on the pitching process.

LBB> Tell us a bit about Moah Studio BV – when did you form and why?

Dirk> We launched in 2024, but the idea had been brewing for years.

I've done this before. At Jam3, I set up and scaled a team from zero to over 30 people within a year, then spent time running a large department at Monks. You learn a lot building teams and shipping work for global brands, but you also see the friction up close. The layers. The billable hour pressure. The distance between senior thinking and actual output.

Pedro came from the platform side, designing for Meta, Google, and others. He'd seen how the best digital products get made when craft and speed work together. Jason built his reputation as a storyteller and producer of innovative work, always finding ways to make complex productions feel human.

The three of us kept coming back to the same question: what if you built a studio without the baggage? No layers, no billable pressure, just senior people doing the work and adopting tools the moment they're useful.

That's Moah. In a sea of sameness, we want to be the partner that delivers a burst of growth through originality. Small teams, embedded in your rhythm, moving fast without sacrificing craft.

LBB> What's the story behind your name?

Dirk> Moah is inspired by ’Moa,’ the Mawé word for ’Path.’ For us, the path is the point. It's how we think, create, and build.

When we started talking about what this studio should feel like, we kept returning to the idea that the journey matters as much as the destination. Not in a fluffy way, but practically. The best work happens when curiosity and rigour meet, when you're genuinely exploring rather than just executing a brief.

Everything we make is shaped by craft, innovation, and technology. For our clients, that means solutions that blend technology with humanity, scale with connection, growth with real purpose.

Plus, after years at agencies with increasingly complex names, we wanted something you could actually say in a meeting without stumbling.

LBB> Tell us about a few campaigns that epitomise what you do as a company.

Dirk> We're a young studio, so most current work is under NDA. That's actually one of our differentiators. We embed so deeply with clients that the work often ships under their brand, not ours. We're comfortable with that trade-off.

What I can share is the type of challenges we gravitate toward:

Rethinking how people find work. We helped reimagine a full experience centre and digital ecosystem for a job centre to be more AI-centric. Not just a better interface, but fundamentally rethinking how job seekers discover opportunities, learn new skills based on industry needs, and get support for the long run. Pedro led the design thinking on that one, bringing his platform experience to something with genuine social impact.

Making fans the centre of the product. We helped rethink a digital product to become truly fan-centric. That meant diving into the data to understand what fans actually want, then finding ways to bring friend groups closer together and gamify the watching experience through a second-screen product. Jason's storytelling instincts shaped how we approached the emotional arc of that experience.

Building brands that scale. We believe brand design needs to live and breathe the brand from both a strategic and visual perspective. But it also needs to scale in an age where go-to-market strategies shift quickly based on market demands. We know how to build systems that flex with those changes, using the newest tools and fewer presentations.

The thread connecting all of it: we're not delivering assets, we're helping clients rethink how things work.

LBB> Give us a fun fact about your company.

Dirk> We don't do the big reveal. Most agencies hide their working files, then present polished decks like a magic trick. We work differently. Clients have access to our working files from day one. They see the messy middle. They're in our Figma, our Slack, our process.

It sounds small, but it changes everything. Decisions happen faster. Feedback flows continuously instead of waiting for a presentation. We're genuinely embedded, not performing collaboration.

LBB> What are your strongest opinions about your industry?

Dirk> The senior-team-in-the-pitch, junior-team-on-the-project dynamic has eroded trust across the industry. Research shows only 18% of marketers feel confident in their agency partners. That's a systemic problem worth fixing.

Our opinion: without the pressure to maximise billables, you can keep your best people close to the work. You can adopt tools that extend your capabilities rather than protecting old workflows. You can focus on originality instead of volume.

The industry has a sameness problem. Everyone's using similar tools, similar processes, similar references. Brands don't need another agency that looks like everyone else. They need a partner who can deliver a genuine burst of growth through original thinking. That's the gap we're focused on.

LBB> What are you proudest of as a company?

Dirk> That we've built something sustainable from day one. No external funding, no pressure to grow at all costs, no compromising on who we work with or how we work. Every client has been a deliberate choice. Every team member is senior talent we'd want to work with for years.

I'm also proud that clients extend engagements without us asking. That's the real test. Not whether you can win the pitch, but whether they want to keep working with you once they've experienced the reality.

LBB> What are some upcoming projects our readers should keep an eye on?

Dirk> We've just wrapped a major product strategy rethink for a game studio, helping them reconsider not just the interface but how the entire experience connects with players. That type of work, where we're in the room reshaping how things work rather than executing someone else's brief, is exactly where we want to be.

Singapore is expanding too. Jason's building out our APAC presence, and we're seeing real appetite from brands who are tired of the traditional agency dance. Small senior teams, embedded ways of working, original thinking. It resonates there as much as it does in Europe and the US.

LBB> Where can we check out Moah Studio BV online?

Dirk> moah.studio is home base. We're also on LinkedIn where we share thinking about where the industry is heading. Less portfolio, more perspective. For the work itself, reach out directly. We'd rather have a conversation than send a deck.