OUR STORY

YONCA TEMIZOCAK O'MAHONY 

I always knew I wanted to create experiences that made people feel something. I just didn't know it was called event management.

There was no degree for it. No clear path. No one to tell me how. So life took me there instead — one experience, one stage, one electric moment at a time. Everything I know I learned by doing. And everything I do now is to make sure the next generation doesn't have to figure it out alone.

I grew up in Turkey, curious about everything. I studied sociology because I wanted to understand people — why they connect, why they remember certain moments and forget others, why some experiences change you and some just pass through. Then I chased a Masters in Communications in Florence, because one country was never going to be enough for me.

The answer to all those questions, I slowly discovered, was always the same.

Soul.

In 2004 I joined Dinamo FM, a startup alternative music radio station in Istanbul that had more passion than budget and more ideas than anyone knew what to do with. We built it from nothing into a multi-million dollar brand. We booked James, Marilyn Manson, Juliette Lewis, Groove Armada, Kelis, Pussycat Dolls and more. We produced 200+ live events. I watched Pussycat Dolls own a stage while an entire crowd sang every word, nobody breathing, confetti exploding above their heads. I watched Juliette Lewis dive into the crowd at the peak of a song and disappear into a sea of pure joy.

Those moments did something to me. They confirmed everything I had always felt but never had words for.

And then in 2006 we did something nobody told us we could do.

We built our own festival.

Radar Live was born because we believed people deserved to feel something different. Not just a show. A whole world they could step into and feel completely, utterly alive. A young passionate team obsessed with music and everything that wraps itself around a once in a lifetime experience. We didn't have a blueprint. We had a belief.

That festival changed everything.

It led me to Sziget one of Europe's greatest cultural experiences where I led national strategy for nine extraordinary years. Millions of people. Life changing moments. I've stood at midnight watching giant street theatre wash over a crowd and thought — am I in a dream? I watched Turkish acts I had booked take the stage — raki in hand (our traditional spirit) while Sziget citizens from every nationality danced together beneath the stars. I have never felt more proud.

Those moments are not accidents. Every feeling is curated. Every detail has a purpose. Soul is not an accident.

Alongside Sziget I co-founded Good News Communications & Events delivering everything from boutique activations to large scale concerts and art exhibitions. Audiences of 300,000+. I was always obsessed with the little details, the curated moments, the creative decisions nobody else noticed but everybody felt. I've seen strangers stand alone at our Museum of Broken Relationships on Valentine's Day trying to hide their tear overwhelmed by a feeling they weren't expecting.

In between all of this I became a national tennis champion, travelling across Turkey and Europe for tournaments since the age of ten. I raced cars in the Polo Ladies Cup before F1 races in Turkey. I made a documentary series about women across six generations. I created a sustainability YouTube program called Sustainabl(ish) Life. I co-founded Jump Start Kids with my husband in both Turkey and Australia. I taught at university. I studied sustainability at the London School of Economics.

I love learning and experiencing life fully. Always have.

And then in 2021 I moved to Australia with my two young kids and my husband at 44, starting from zero all over again.

Some people thought I was crazy. I thought I was finally ready.

I arrived feeling more alive than ever, excited by everything, grateful for everything, and carrying twenty years of experience and one dream I couldn't let go of.

To bring that feeling here.

That dream became The Creative Fields, a consultancy for companies who want their events to mean something. Not just run well, but leave people with that feeling they can't quite explain but desperately want to feel again.

And it led me to one of the greatest privileges of my career teaching Event Management at the International College of Management Sydney and Torrens University, where I have already developed two courses. Because I want the next generation to have the education I never had. To walk the path I had to build myself.

The best thing about learning by doing? You understand the logic of it. That's what I try to give my students not just theory from books, but the ability to think, question and ask does this actually make sense in real life?

Events are not just projects. They are feelings.

And I've spent my whole life proving it.

When did you last leave an event and couldn't stop thinking about it?

That feeling is designable. And I'd love to help you create it. 🫧

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