Last Thursday some of us COLABORATORY interns had the opportunity to meet the brilliant folks at Fashionbuddha, via a typetour of Portland hosted by the ever-so-connected Bram Pitoyo.
Creative Director Todd Greco showed us one of Fashionbuddha's crowning badass projects to date: their DIY touch screen table. Think Microsoft Surface ($17,000) meets a small budget ($1,000-ish). It really blew my mind. Interactive art gallery openings and collaborative symphonic sounds all coming out of one relatively simple contraption. It's agencies like Fashionbuddha that make me increasingly thrilled by the creative work being pumped out of Portland. Great stuff, Fashionbuddha. Thanks for having us!
To watch Todd's presentation on how a DIY touch screen table is made and the insane apps Fashionbuddha has made to go along, see his speech from Ignite Portland.
There are few ideas that cross my path that give me such ample fuel to explain and generally geek out about marketing quite like these two.
I often find myself fumbling when I try to explain my business marketing degree to others. I run in a mostly artistic, creative and liberal circle which translates to a generally hostile mentality when it comes to anything business related. After assuring them that not all marketers adore Super Bowl ads, nor do we all focus on profit oriented advertising schemes, I then launch into a spiel about how I really just love people with good ideas. I love the idea of making one person's BIG, good idea happen with other good ideas. Idealistic and hokey, I know, but really, its what got me through all those corporate finance classes in business school.
Best ideas I have heard this week; things I'm willing to word-of-mouth market and would love to get behind in a bigger way -
Contrail
It's bikes, it's art, it's community, it's clever. The Contrail, a chalk tool for bikes, had me at "pretty colors."
Contrail is a chalking device attached to bicyclists' wheels in order to create "trails" or bright ribbons of color in heavily trafficked biking areas. The idea being, bikers proactively create awareness of shared road spaces.
More bikers = more color = heads up for motor vehicles.
Contrail was a concept design submission for a 2008 contest and is not in production yet, but hopefully with enough support something will materialize soon.
Obviously, I think Portland would be an amazing place to kick off a product launch of the Contrail. Can you imagine the colors on Clinton Street or Hawthorne... or, really anywhere in this bike-loving town? It would be great. I suppose the frequent rain could be a problem, but that's a minor detail in the grand scheme of this art+bike+community love obsession.
Carrotmob It's the opposite of boycotting.
Frustrated with the not-so productive nature of traditional activism and the act of boycotting, Carrotmobfounders conceived the idea of "carrotmobbing." A large network of organized consumers supports on-mass a business that is choosing to make socially and environmentally responsible business practices. By mobbing the business all on one day, the business gets a ton of publicity and a ton of cash to support their worthy endeavors.
I had heard of Carrotmob before, but the full extent of its awesomeness really hit me this week when I learned about Carrotmob's recent invasion of Hot Lips Pizza in Portland. Carrotmob invaded Hot Lips and racked in a over $6,000 for the business on what typically would have been a slow Sunday with as little as $2,000 in sales. The added income will be used for Hot Lips' commitment to make their locations more energy-efficient.
Watch this video for more on Carrotmob and a look at the first ever Carrotmob event that slammed a liquor store with business in San Francisco.
In my purse, next to my bed, underneath my coffee cup and in the back pocket of my pack you will find a journal.
I have journals of all sorts. I typically use the classic small Moleskines. I vary amongst the lined/plain/and graph paper options. The tipping point of like ---> love for me with these journals is when their kraft outsides become soft and fuzzy from rubbing in your pocket so much. It's really a beautiful thing. When I go on a big adventure, like a trip to India, I opt for the classier version of the Moleskine, bound in black and perfectly suited for heavier sketches and scuff marks from adventures. I've also acquired many miscellaneous journals in recent months. One of my favorite new items is my "FIELD NOTES" journal from Draplin Design Co. (thanks to Portland marketing collective, MilkMilk, for the goody).
I use journals for just about everything. I make sketches for my homework for classes.
I take note of important things while I'm traveling. Volunteer ID card from Mother Theresa's House, daily schedule notes and ideas:
Given the prompt to draw a monkey and a lion playing together, I sketched this in one of my journals:
All of my journals have the same last page: Current Feeling. It's a habit I picked up while traveling. I tell myself, at the least, I can simply jot down my current emotion in my journals. Long entries are infrequent for me, however the cumulative sentiment of a whole page of my feelings tracked over a period of time is surprisingly representative.
This one time, I had an idea for a blog and I wrote it down.
My journals are like a community. I feel supported, nagged at, reminded and inspired by all those darn little pages.
Today I went through my journal from my India trip and decided to scan some of my sketches I had made while traveling. I realized one of the most amazingly striking pages in my whole journal was one that I never really intended to be art.
Every morning I would take the 202 city bus to work. For four rupees I would get a small little ticket stub--a scrap piece of paper the bus owner had stamped a ticket number on. Everyday was a different ticket. After purchasing a glue stick at the market, these little bits of paper quickly became my daily craft project. So many colors. So very India.
I haven't been this eager to share an artist in quite some time. This is exciting.
Mark Khaisman's art consist simply of brown packing tape layered on plexiglas and then back lit for an oh-so-just-right amber glow. I really do adore art that makes effective something as generic as packing tape.
there is a mural in seattle on capitol hill next to the value village. it is new (well, new to me) and it is so very spectacular. everyone should go take their picture in front of it.
after annie and i went to see the mural, i walked to the train station to go back to portland.
one of my favorite people in the whole world, miss annie murphy, is best described as a perfect pancake. precisely constructed when you least expect it. (please refer to diagram for further detail)
Saturday night my dear friend Greg Boudreauand I went on some biking adventures. The intent for the night was to check out the Ballard Art Walk, but in true Greg/Katie fashion much more ensued. The first of our unexpected gems of the night was a chance to show Greg my new favorite spot in Ballard. Some of you may have heard of the Little Ballard House; if you haven't and you are mildly to extremely alarmed by urban sprawl, then listen.
The Little Ballard House is located just adjacent to the Ballard bridge. In the wake of condo-mania and development madness in Ballard, one little old woman by the name of Edith Macefield chose not to sell her longtime home. Despite handsome offers from buyers and the pressures to sell, Edith insisted on staying in her home and was the only one to do so on her entire city block. Did this this stop construction of the new Trader Joe's and 24 Hour Fitness? Certainly not. They simply built around Edith's home.
I drive by this house everyday on my way to work. It is absolutely astounding and definitely one of those hidden urban secrets that I absolutely adore. Every time I think of that old Walt Disney cartoon where the city goes up all around the little house and the house gets depressed and lonely.
Sadly, Edith past away a few weeks back and no one knows for sure what will happen to the house since she didn't have any family she left it to. I hope this house is here for a long while (though, the use of extendable beams during construction would suggest otherwise). Or better still, I hope Greg makes a stencil of this scene. It really ought to be remembered in some way or form.
That was the first super cool stop of the night.
Then we went to Gasworks Park to try to find some friends. No luck. Then to Art Walk, where quite possibly the highlight of the night was a gallery featuring three year old art. Nope. Not art that's been installed for three years. This was art produced by a three year old. That's right folks, only in Ballard will you find artsy adults sipping wine amongst My Little Pony sticker encrusted "art." I loved it. I don't think Greg was too amused.
Lastly, we ventured over to King's for one (or two...) pitchers of beer. It was at this point in the night where I realized something about my friendship with Greg. We are the type of friends who don't just hangout. Our outings are more amply defined as "sessions." Our conversations evolve into masterful plans and lists of creative projects. Case in point, our night at King's produced two well thought out critiques of two business plans, discussion of at least three very likely future art projects and last, but not least, a plan for a most excellent cultural outing. We decided it would be super great if we gathered up our group of friends and had a weekend full of very culturally unsettling events. So far on our list: Ride the Duck (that hideously annoying tourist attraction in Seattle), the mall, Cabella's Super Store, dinner at Chili's and then to a monster truck pull. Who's in?
