About Sonja

Sonja Phillips is an award winning writer and director, her work encompasses short drama, documentaries, as well as a variety of commercial ads for brands like Tesco, Pandora, Dove and has created and directed idents for Channel 4, ITV, Lifetime and Dmax rebrands.

Starting her career directing A-list music promos, in 1998 Sonja quickly made the move into broadcasting, writing and directing a documentary about the Bosnian War. Snapped up by Discovery Channel, she won a cluster of awards for the multitude of short content she generated at the company, including U.S. festival awards for her film about Northern Lights. When headhunted for a move to Channel 4 in 2001, she continued and built on her success as a writer and director of documentary and imaginative visual pieces.

Her drama debut, The Knickerman (2005), won her the L.A. Short Film Festival, and led to the creation of Andsome Films, her own production platform. From here, she launched the Dmax channel, alongside her growing portfolio of idents, promos, and short films for varied commissioners. She produced eight short documentaries for Animal Planet about the bond between animals and humans.

Sonja repeated her success in L.A. with her second fiction short The Pond, also winning at the Sapporo and Rhode Island International Film Festivals. 2012-13 she worked on the rebrand of ITV1, (including the writing and directing of 60 idents), and the launch of Lifetime Channel. Her commercial work includes an online ad for Tesco mobile, creating and directing the advertising campaign for Lara Bohinc, and most recently, a top-ten-listed global Christmas ad for Pandora Jewellery. Sonja continues as a regular creative and director at the BBC, Channel 4 and The Discovery Channel.