The Shimmering
A Person, a Presence, a Brand I was working outside of the city, treasure-hunting. Actually, I was working inside a brand, their teams, looking for treasure — those glimmering and glistening points of compassed reference, the surveilled pin-pricks of a brand mapping,...
I’m Lost
The Beauty of Being Lost and Finding Found The signs that point to nowhere. Earlier, I was in Paris — I was working in an area that I was relatively familiar with — off Musée du Louvre, not far from the Seine. I’d been there, staying there, working many times,...
The Watch and the Sphere of Focus
The Study of Watch Fullness, Surveilling the Terrain Around You. Really, what are you looking at? In the real construct of study, what are you really looking at? I look for allegory and metaphor, inspiration and insight in the journey of the day. Every day, a journey....
THE ART OF THE ALPHABET
The twists and turns of meaning — drawn knowledge. In teaching workshops on the alphabet, and especially finding your own place in the quintessential expression of the YOU, in alphabetic form — the flow of your presence. What I believe is that each person has traits...
THE PERFUME OF YOU
THE MOST EXPENSIVE PERFUME IN THE WORLD A happier scent. It might be said that the most valuable perfume there could be would be your personal scent — the layering of molecular expressions that gather everything from your being, your roadwork, scenes seen — the way...
Looking for Magic
The quest for the magical — in craft, design, business strategies and brand. In a manner, the work that we all do is a quest — the pursuit of a question to be answered, the pathway to a question contained, opened and discovered. What we all do, and what we craft as...
How Strong Is Your Brand?
Resilience, strength, responsiveness Brands, given their human provenance, have human character in their attitude. A brand doesn’t simply move along of its own accord, it’s not a robotic unit, it’s fired and fueled by humans on both sides of the equation. People...
Top [Secret] Design
Brands That Survive on Stealth, Secrecy and Intrigue I was sitting on a jet with a talkative neighbor, a US Marshal, who coincidentally spoke to me on the theories of the layering of police, detection and intelligence — I thought, “how intriguing.” And then wondered...
How to Do Nothing
The Art of Spacing In. In the frenzy of our present experience, we all struggle with the ever-unrelenting issue of connectivity. We need to be connected to everything, all the time. There is a phrase in the context of social and hybrid community management known as...
THE SYMBOLISM OF THE ROPE, TYING AND THE KNOT
THE THREADING OF IDEAS: THE WEFT, WARP, AND LOOM OF DESIGN As a designer, there can’t be a metaphor more powerful than weaving — the ultimate layering of storytelling — the fantastic pattern-maker and emblem of discovery. In our work, we persistently speak to the...