Jan 25, 2012 1
Recently CreativeMornings founder Tina Roth-Eisenberg a.k.a SwissMiss went to see a talk at the Atlanta chapter.
While she was there she was interviewed by Ron Dawson of Dare Dreamer magazine for the video above.
It’s such a neat encapsulation of what attracted me to CreativeMornings and why I was so desperate to bring it to London way back in 2010.
Jan 9, 2012 0
After a CreativeMornings Christmas/New Year break, it gives me enormous pleasure to introduce our first speaker for 2012, David Barrie.
In an era where we’re exhorted to be more active in our communities but struggle -perhaps through lack of practice, perhaps due to a lack of suitable infrastructure- David’s been building the platforms and imparting the knowledge to bring communities back together.
His passionate drive for participative urban regeneration has seen projects launched all over the country, successfully harnessing the latent creativity and capability of citizens to bring about positive change.
With a continued focus on how the creative sector can make a positive contribution to broader society, something that Chris Bangle riffed on at CreativeMornings/London August, David’s sure to make another great contribution to the dialogue.
Read our usual interview with David below and make sure to set your alarms for 11:00 am on Monday, January 23 to secure your tickets.
David Barrie will be appearing at CreativeMornings/London on Friday January 27th at Buro Happold at at 71 Newman St, W1T 3AH. For more information and to reserve tickets, please go to the CreativeMornings London Eventbrite page.
Jan 3, 2012 1
During the interminable wait to get on a rescheduled flight to Tasmania I started idly flicking through my blog feeds.
More often than not I hit “mark all as read” rather than actually doing any reading.
But my eye was caught by a post by Steve Jones on the Fast Company blog titled Authenticity Vs. Perfection: How To Brand Like A Rock Star.
A lengthy excerpt from a book, my sleep-deprived, caffeine-addled brain skimmed most of it.
But the central thesis is one that has resonated with me since I started my journey into brand strategy in 2005.
Here’s my riff on it: humans are imperfect but imperfection lends individuals their character. It’s character, our unique mix of our perfect and imperfect qualities, that acts as our emotional magnet, attracting or repelling fellow humans. It could be said that the more honest we are about our mix of perfect and imperfect, the more authentic we’re being. And, in my experience at least, authentic people have deeper, more engaged and longer-lasting relationships.
And so it could be (should be?) with brands.
Because we want brands to be our best friends after all.
Dec 5, 2011 4
In 1951, a Shell advert proclaimed that one went “very fast very gently in a Bentley”.
In that same year, Bentley’s own advertising proclaimed that theirs was “The Silent Sports Car”.
David Ogilvy, in his imperious advert for the ’59 Rolls Royce, went so far as to say that the Bentley alternative was for the diffident.
And even when growing up in the decade that taste largely forgot – the 1980s – Bentley remained the choice of the discreet.
Indeed, all the way up until 2003 a Bentley was a luxuriously appointed ride under the radar.
Then Volkswagen came along and buggered it all up.
Nov 23, 2011 1
I come from a design background.
I work across the worlds of communications, branding and business strategy.
It’s pretty easy for people to get confused about what kind of beast I am.
Hell, sometimes -when coffee is conspicuous by its absence- even I get confused.
Thankfully Peter Thomson over at The Economics of Innovation did a vox pops with his strategist mates, helping set everyone straight about just what it is that we do.
Oct 25, 2011 0
When I was a kid, the sciences straight-up fascinated me. Early high-school experiments looking at boiling points, the insides of rodents and the creation of artificial flavours and scents meant that science classes were a thrice weekly doorway to enchantment.
Oct 18, 2011 0
Aug 17, 2011 1
This month sees CreativeMornings London presented by one of the greats of automotive design.
Chris Bangle didn’t just radically alter the way we automotive designers think about package, proportion and surface (the aesthetic and structural skin of the car) and how consumers respond to it. He also masterfully wielded the transformative power of creative thinking in the business context.
In so doing, he helped irrevocably alter the course, aesthetically and strategically, of what was probably the car industry’s most conservative manufacturer, BMW Group.
Upon leaving BMW in 2009 he became the go-to consultant for companies, both automotive and otherwise, wanting to “do a BMW” and set up Chris Bangle Associates to service them. Operating out of an enchanting hill-top estate in the Piemonte region of Italy, he’s currently a creative brains trust for Korean technology giant Samsung. He also continues to push the thinking around future mobility and automotive design with MIT, Scuola Politecnica di Design and the Singaporean Design Council.
Having previously enjoyed Chris holding forth, both over the breakfast table and in front of a theatre of 500, attendees of CreativeMornings London in September are in for a real treat. In the mean time, we’ve presented him with our usual questions to get him (and you) warmed up. You can also read a review of his keynote at Umea University here and see his TED talk here.
DS
Chris Bangle will be appearing at CreativeMornings London on Tuesday September 6th at Buro Happold. For more information and to reserve tickets, please go to the CreativeMornings London Eventbrite page.
Where do you go when you need to concentrate?
In the kitchen, when my wife is not around!
Is it about what you know or who you know?
Start with WHY you know something, progress thru HOW and WHAT you know. “Who”s pop up now and then at all levels like many enablers. Read the rest of this entry »
Aug 3, 2011 3
If austerity is all the rage, someone forgot to tell the manufacturers of city runabouts. Aston Martin’s much-maligned £35k Cygnet -based on the humble £10k Toyota iQ- is just starting to hit the streets. It’s also available in an even more exclusive Colette edition.
The amusingly named Fiat Abarth 695 Tributo Ferrari has been terrorising residents of Belgravia since late last year at an unamusingly steep £30k.
And the £11k Fiat 500 on which the Tributo is based is now available in a Gucci edition for a £5k premium.
Even Citroen is in on the act with the Orla Kiely-fettled edition of their quasi-premium DS3.
It doesn’t stop there, however.
Having the last laugh -as is so often the case in the Automotive world- are the Germans.
BMW Group brands Rolls Royce and Mini recently had a pash behind the bike shed and produced the Mini Inspired by Goodwood.
What do you get for your £25k premium over a standard £16k Mini? Leather, leather (everywhere), walnut veneers made at the Rolls Royce plant in Goodwood, “deep-shag” carpets and the smug satisfaction that, if you hadn’t worked it out already, you’re one of 1000 willing to pay £41,000 for a Mini.
Downsized luxury is everywhere these days; nary a day goes by when a report crosses my desk telling me that, despite the economic uncertainty, people are still enjoying luxuries, just in smaller portions. Now consumers can do it with their cars. Just don’t expect it to come cheap.
