Stories, myths, legends, tales — the link to humanity
If there’s a story
about a person,
which might be
a legacy,
a family,
a product —
a brand —
who’s telling it,
and who cares?
There are chains, coils, rings that sync and bridge the connections of one to the many.
But in the meditations on the work, the practice of creating things that connect people, we’re constantly thinking about how those alchemical attachments and those stamped amalgams work.
As a designer, in making things that link people together, that admixture is a chainmail, a hammering of many rings that form the new idea — or the story that could be for just one person. That one person — in the chained linkage — holds that story like the ringlet of the personal place that rings round them. From this ring — the personal space, the circle around the person — there are places of touch that connect one to another.
That story could be just for one person — and they hold it, in their own way. But eventually there will be a retelling. The legend becomes a telling that is held by the many. That myth spreads generations of experience and knowing — and the telling is spilled as a mystery, one to another, one to many, one to one million — billions, later, know one version of the story that has been recounted in multiplicity.
T H E
E T Y M O L O G Y
O F T H E L I N K
Any link will be about the strength of that connection. Link is an ancient telling. I go back.
Recounting the word, as an allegory of connection, begins at the bridge to the English language in the middle of the 15th century, “one of a series of rings or loops which form a chain.” It’s been suggested that this is derived probably from Old Norse *hlenkr (and by comparison — Old Swedish lænker “chain, link,” Norwegian — lenke, the Danish lænke). But the beginnings might be Proto Germanic — *khlankijaz (as in the German — lenken “to bend, turn, lead,” or gelenk “articulation, joint, link,” and later, the Old English —hlencan (pl.) “armor”). The most ancient seed for the word sound comes from the mist of the Proto Indo European lexicon — the base: *qleng– “to bend.” The word group — missing link — between man and apes dates to 1880.
the brynie chainmail of Bayeux Museum
The point of the study is the meaning behind the meaning. And being designers, strategists, writers and those that reach into the ephemeral bridge between emotionality and conscious choice the character of the deeper meaning of words will transcend time and create links between foundational ideas and the inspirations of their evolvements.
The allegory of the link — even in the context of the ringing of armor — relates to the character of connection. In designing a story, brand or otherwise, the nature of the telling finds a symbolic bridging.
T H E A L L E G O R Y
O F T H E L I N K
A N D
S T O R Y T E L L I N G
D E V E L O P M E N T
The chain, the ring, the rope, the knot — forging stories as metaphorical connections from, and to, people.
What is the type of telling (riveted, butted, or welded)?
What is the material that is used (iron, bronze, or steel)?
What is the density of the weave? The tighter the woven character, the more “impenetrable” it is.
And the thickness of the “ring.”
Thinking metaphorically about what this might represent in terms of messaging and framing — would be:
• In building the bridging — is this story something that is a series of connected, attached (rivet) stories (social media ringing or digitally connected rippling “Old Spice and Isaiah Mustafa”)? Or perhaps one story fitting to another (butted), one story “chaptered” to another — like filmed branding (Vans’TV or American Eagle’s roadtripping)? Or welded — one long storytelling, (Mother Boyle and Columbia Sportswear), that is relatively connected as a threaded framing?
• Materiality — whether iron (malleable), bronze (mixable), or steel (super “hard”). These might relate to the discipline of their making — one sequence might be more casually framed, another grouping could be combinant media; and “steel” might be a superstructure of highly organized media.
• The hardness of the ring? In any storytelling — there are tales that are synced to a precisely knit meme or grouping of people, adhering to self-held ideals. And then there are other tellings that reach out, the long running — to another great mass of humanity. How close the ring, and how hard its measure?
Steel
The link is an element of human design, that might find inspirations in natural expressions and biological design systems (which are inherently more profoundly loose in their assembly. The organic “ringing” is something that allows rings to fit together, in whatever magnitude might be discerned. And to that discernment — understanding these could be beyond the scope of our imaginings. The ring, the chainmail armour, the rippling of interconnectedness and interlacement — stories are alive in that they are human made. Humans touch them, share them, and they are influenced by their interconnection.
These symbolisms might be lost on the media planner — I’m thinking big picture.
Big story. Large idea.
And, to our take at least — what lies beneath.
And how beautiful is the chain of interconnection?
TIM | New York City
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THE STORY STRATEGY OF THE LUXURY BRAND
Girvin Brand Luxe | http://bit.ly/gTW5HZ