Gotta take a deep breath.
Yesterday we started the day late. First, and only, thing on our schedule was to go to Magma Books. It sounds dumb to come all the way to London to visit a book store, but it was pretty sweet. It is a store fully of design books, and very little else. This ranges from architecture to graphic design to type book to advertising to the ends of the earth. If I lived here I would probably spend all of my money in there. It was very cool.
After that Alex and I headed out. We had the whole afternoon free. (Took a slight detour to a magic shop - he's a geek for that type of stuff). But then we were on a mission. A mission to find W+K, and some Banksy. This search is what led us to the east side, and end of my complimentary map from the hotel (yeah, I have a map now!). Took us a good few hours to find the agency, and it rained on us a lot. The agency was pretty hard to find, and no one around knew any of the street names, but alas, SUCCESS!
While on our journey we found a real Banksy! This graffiti artist is pretty well known. His work is hard to find though because usually it is in back alleys, and sketch places. Also, it gets taken down rapidly, or defaced. I had found a few locations and a blog that was updated regularly with sightings/ updates about freshness. The one I stumbled upon was not on any of these location sites, so we're thinking it might be relatively new. It was an awesome find.
Back to the agency.... We walked in the front door as a man was walking out. He said, "You know this is an agency." We laughed, and said yes (we must've looked pretty roughed up from the rain!!!), then made it to the reception desk (further than we ever expected). Told them we were from the States and wanted to talk to someone. They didn't know what to do with us, haha. We got an e-mail address on a post-it note. And left.
Blah blah blah. Rest of the day: grabbed lunch at Wagamamas (delicious), walked through a little dinky shop (turned out the lady working there, Emma-Jane, knows someone that works at W+K Portland! Small world. She gave us his contact information as well!), then sort of headed back to the hotel. Took a wee nap. GOT AN E-MAIL BACK FROM W+K SCHEDULING A MEETING WITH US!!!! Then 15 of us went to dinner. We went to an Indian place. Not very good Indian food, but a good enough dinner. After dinner three of us decided to head back to do research on the team we were meeting, and the agency in general.
Blah blah blah.
Today, Alex, Phillip (we let him tag along), and I skipped the museum tour scheduled (at the National Gallery), because we had a meeting at W+K! We met with Pat McKay, and Feh Tarty. Google them. They're a fantastic team!!! They worked at Goodby Silverstein in San Francisco before (another great agency). It was great to talk to American transplants, and get their views on the actual differences between here and there. They were very knowledgeable and full of great advice! It was an incredible opportunity. I would love to go into more depth and talk more about the meeting, but it is tea time with Homeslice Mark. Just know, it was worth it! (Also, mom you will like to know that we think that they took the meeting with us because both of them looked at SCAD when applying for schools... your millions of dollars in tuition for the name SCAD is worth it!)
Love to you all, Cheers!
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So will you be looking for this in January of next year: http://www.wk12.com/application.html? I have been googling Banksy, and Fey Tarty and Pat McKay, and Wieden + Kennedy. Very cool. Way to go and make a contact. And I'll visit you in Portland, too. I assume Mark thought your meeting was a fair trade for the National Museum.
ReplyDeleteDid I tell you that I got a free text from AT&T suggesting I might want to look into an International plan?? I assume you are not calling anyone since you are with the group.
And which of the graffiti are the Banksy's ? The second two make sense but the first one?
I bought a new kitchen light fixture from a guy who is working a second job at Lowe's to pay for 2 college kids - and they are both at Georgia schools with Hope!!!
Love you, Mom
By the way, we are taking the light fixture back, for another one. Mom says retro and I say outdated. She wanted someone to post and now she's going to regret it.
ReplyDeleteOn another note the puppy had a case of something called HGE. Google it. So she spent a few days at the vet. She is fine now. Also dad is convinced mom poisoned the dog; I don't buy it. She is home and happy except that dad is only feeding her 4 tiny meals a day and the dog is convinced she is starving.
I am so glad you are having a great time and doing a lot of interesting things. Miss you.
Mom- to get to be one of the twelve is practically impossible if you degree is in Advertising, believe it or not. They really look for other types of creative people for that. Here that have something different, called W_K Platform, which I didn't know about until yesterday. I think it is the same sort of deal though. Mark was shocked, and proud of us. He had tried multiple times to get in contact, and schedule a meeting with them, but had no success.
ReplyDeleteYou did not tell me about that text, but I am not using my phone. There have been a few texts here and there. But not since I got with the group.
"Happiness" and the manmeditating are not Banksy, they are just examples of being on the eastside of london. Plus, after getting the meeting with W+K we were full of happiness, hah.
Are you thinking about getting a second job at Lowe's? Seems like it.
Erica- Silly mom, thinking she could buy something without us around! What a goof ball.
SAMMY :-( Awwww that makes me sad! I am glad she is okay. It's interesting that that thing mostly only happens in young, little puppies. Poor dear. I bet she is starving! She'll be okay.
Miss you and am thinking about you! Hope all else is well.