Clerkenwell Design Week

I managed to make the last day of the Clerkenwell design week exhibitions yesterday night to catch the last bits of the exhibitions and free champagne! Here’s some of my Hipstamatic pics from the main shows at the Farmiloe building and from Boss design.  I am in love with Tom Dixon’s mirror balls and flouro lights

 Dulux - Let’s Colour

Here’s some amazing footage from the new viral by Dulux and Euro RSCG.  They’ve made a beautiful film and great campaign site http://www.letscolourproject.com/ to illustrate what an effect colour can have on the lives of people all over the world from Shoreditch to Rio.  What a lovely idea for a campaign!

A visit to the Magnificent Maps exhibition at the British Library over the weekend confirmed the fact that yes, I am definitely a cartophile.  I think it’s because creating a map is something else that’s both an art and a science.  My favourite piece at the exhibition was Stephen Walter’s “The Island” http://www.stephenwalter.co.uk/drawings.php which is basically a hand drawn map of London as a commuter island. 

Whilst it’s geographically absolutely correct, it also has annotations on every spare space on the map; detailing personal memories of the artist, along with facts about the area in question.  The fact that it’s so detailed is the best bit about it - something that you could never get tired of looking at, were it hanging on your wall. 

I’ve loved the illustrator Yulia Brodskaya’s work for a while now and I just found out that she’s involved in a new project for Maggie’s Centres, a UK based cancer charity.  The project’s called Memories http://memories.subism.co.uk/ and over 100 illustrators and designers have now joined the project, to create a piece each for a final book. 

As well as Yulia, there’s a whole host of other really great illustrators - the most recent joiners are Niel Quisaba: http://www.digitaldelight.org/ and Ben O’Brien: http://www.bentheillustrator.com/. 

I’m looking forward to seeing the book!

I’m looking forward to all things New York at the moment so I love this music video tribute to Jay Z with it’s simple mix of type and great photography. 

So Chatroulette has been doing the rounds in industry news for a few months now and advertisers are just beginning to think “how can I make money out of this”.  It’s an interesting one because at first the advertising potential seems clear - you’ve got people with time on their hands who you can sell stuff to via videos. 

The question is really whether it’s possible to advertise directly through the service similar to what GiffGaff have done here: http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1847321790?bctid=73306375001.  It’s a nice idea but it’s difficult to tell whether it will have an impact on either sales or brand awarenss because Chatroulette is such a niche site at the moment and there’s really no way to know that you’re targeting anywhere near the right customers. 

So perhaps Chatroulette is still in it’s infancy…but we’ve had one brilliant example of how to use it for marketing - the is it, isn’t it Ben Folds video by Merton: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTwJetox_tU and then the brilliant response from the real Ben Folds: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfamTmY5REw.  If Ben wanted to raise his profile, that’s one great way to do it! 

For brands advertising there, it’s early days but at the moment it seems like the way to go is more about using chatroulette as part of your digital PR strategy rather than direct ads.  I’m looking forward to seeing many more advertising attempts though!

An art experiment in Japan to create a huge QR code out of sand.  Apparently they’ve got over 400 people to take a snap of the code on their phones to check that it works ok.  See the making of video here: http://summer.sinap.jp/09/index.html.

I’ve just read this article in Design Week about how celebrities like Michael Owen are being branded in order to PR their entire personality to the world at large.  Actually, when the Michael Owen brand values were released http://www.creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/2009/june/michael-owen , there was a genuine outcry amongst the design community, but is personal branding really so tawdry?

Australian designer, Christopher Doyle has just won a D&AD for the project above which, in his own words, “takes the piss” and applies the branding approach that he uses throughout his working life to himself. It’s not an old concept, and has attracted much media attention before thanks to the infamous Stefan Sagmeister self mutilation project http://www.sagmeister.com/work5.html .

What I think is interesting though is that it’s no longer just celebs who are branding themselves; when I started this blog, I came up with a brand (ok, actually I had a lot of help from http://ryantym.tumblr.com/) and in essence, I marketed myself.  I’ve got a ‘presence’ on most of the social networks, as is so often recommended as a strategy to corporate brands and I now use my branding throughout my freelance work as well in order to aquire new contacts and new work.

Social networking has given everyone the ability to brand themselves and, being a bit cynical, sell themselves to the world at large.  From telling people what your favourite films are on Facebook to blogging your opinions and daily thoughts, we’ve all got a personal brand that’s constantly evolving.  It’s not barefaced immodesty, it’s just a modern way of communicating your personality.

Designboom article about different design concepts from around the world depicting a taxi of the future.  My favourite is the Taxi Tokyo http://evatoftum.wordpress.com/ which tows different passenger cars behind it, reducing traffic on the roads…and it looks like something from iRobot.

I love this new campaign for True Blood that’s currently running in the US.  The agency who created the concept have managed to use the reputation of other brands to catch the eyes of millions.  For a good campaign, you need two things: an unquestionably amazing brand or product that you’re selling, and the ability to create a buzz around it.  They’ve managed to get people talking and by leveraging other massive brands, they’ve succeded on both counts.