"The idea of two people in teams is a very old one and I think it's quite good to break it occasionally," says Graham Fink. The ECD for M&C Saatchi, London hopes he's achieved just that by enlisting his longtime friend, graphic design icon Peter Saville, to provide a unique perspective on the agency's commercial, print and outdoor output. One of the UK's most celebrated modern designers, Saville's work for Factory Records in the '80s (Joy Division, New Order) and subsequent Britpop acts like Suede and Pulp, combined with his fashion portfolio (clients included Yohji Yamamoto, Christian Dior and Jill Sander) and experience developing brand identity, makes the 51-year-old maverick a natural candidate for commercial culture critique. "It's this stuff that's filling our world up," he told us after a day at the office. "So I'm quite happy to make some contribution."

You've been described in press releases and reports as everything from a "creative director" to a "provocateur" for M&C Saatchi. What exactly would be the correct term for what you're doing there?
"Creative director" implies a position within the company, and I am outside of the company giving a relatively unbiased view of things. So I am a consultant to the creative department.

Graham has said that he's solicited your opinion to help "shake up" the notion of a creative department.
That's been my reading of what he's trying to do here... I tried to do work with Graham in the early '80s and I realized what different wavelengths designers were on compared to people in advertising. That has significantly changed over the last 10 years in the wake of convergence culture. There's a much greater shared language between the two disciplines now.

What do you think it is you're bringing to the table?
What helps is that I'm not here every day. There's a certain amount of losing the plot or not seeing the forest for the trees when you've been working too long on something. I'm not 'hands-on' or sitting down and designing things for them. I look quite objectively at what they do and tell them what it says to me. I find it quite enjoyable.

As someone who's worked with myriad clients over the last two decades, do you see clients becoming more daring?
Where an agency like M&C and someone like Graham can have direct access to a decision-making person, progress happens. But otherwise everyone's looking over their shoulders. So a situation like this is great - I can give my point of view and have it be inculcated into what they're doing, but I don't personally have to face it out.

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