Natalie Smithson
Creative Lab Founder
Natalie has spent 25 years in marketing, communications, and editorial, creating human connections in a digital world. Blending a career in digital with travel, photography, and human-animal studies, you can give Natalie flip-flops over heels any day. Ever curious about human behaviour, she niched into emerging tech as a copywriter and then moved into AI, fascinated by the mirror it holds up to society. A tough 2022 shifted her outlook on life, leaving her with a need to write and create for creativity’s sake. She set up Nova Is Lost to build a restorative world to show you have everything you need inside you to tackle anything life ever throws at you.
Natalie works as a Brand & Marketing Partner to tech founders, with a keen interest in mental health, women’s health, and child development.
Immersive experience
Simon Austen
Technical Lead
A freelance creative technologist with several entrepreneurial ventures under his belt, Simon likes to “make things that do cool stuff”. He has more ideas running around his mind than a squirrel in a nut factory on its third coffee, but his physics background means he can quickly work out what’s feasible. Being smart, big-hearted, and completely unfazed by incomplete ideas, Simon’s the ideal collaborator to spar with. Immediately connecting with the immersive experience concept, he effortlessly plugged gaps in the original thinking and contributes greatly to its ongoing development, bringing positive encouragement and always ― always, good humour.
Immersive experience
Frances Vieras Blanc
Experience Designer
An experienced, fun-loving creative director, you can give Frances a bag of random objects from the back of the cupboard and she’ll be able to make a jaw-dropping immersive experience out of them. Fiercely eloquent and imaginative, every project Frances is part of is full of life and meaning. With 30 years in entertainment, from theatre, film and video games, she knows how to “craft worlds that captivate, engage and leave a lasting mark,” ― the very thing we’re building with Nova. She knows just what questions to ask to keep the design on track, stay true to the original concept, and make sure every single visitor gets the transformational experience they deserve.