Adele.No longer just a compaign slogan, but a reality, the change we were all longing for is upon us, but in ways we haven’t expected or maybe even desired. That’s the beauty of change though isn’t? It’s different than what we had. Some, many, actually fear change. It disturbs the status quo which can only unearth a whole multitude of sins.

For instance, yesterday I listened to someone giving a short motivational talk and he said, “unless you overcome the fear you have within whatever it is you are seeking will only return even if what you get what you were looking for you succeeded in achieving.” He was quoting from a book citing research that the individuals who created this abundance of white collar crime overwhelmingly had one thing in common: a fear of failure.

So, even though they accumulated millions in personal wealth it was never enough for them. They went on to in some cases embezzle money from their company leaving their employees without jobs and without 401 k’s to keep feeding their fear of failure when all they had to do was get over their fear of failure. Think of the pain they could have spared thousands of people if only they as individuals faced their own fear which had nothing to do with anything but themselves.

It’s exciting to see some of the long sought changes in the status quo coming to fruition. Like some of these instances in financial fraud being uncovered and what and how the bulk of the middle class, in some cases whole industries have arrived at where they (we) are today.
It’s more than exciting, it’s a hoot!

So many honest hard working people left without retirement, without anything because of this fear that drove their leaders over a cliff taking the security of thousands with them. And as it turns out, these aren’t isolated instances. Frankly, Madoff is probably only the tip of the iceberg.

But that’s really only half the story isn’t it? These instances of financial fraud don’t cover the other half which are those who haven’t been swift enough to adapt to the rumblings underneath their wings that said as customers we aren’t going to support you anymore. You aren’t giving us what we want and what our lifestyle needs and demands.

I fault retailers for this as much if not more than manufacturers. The retailers these days have had manufacturers under control. They essentially tell them what they think their customers are clamoring for, that’s not across the board, however. Manufacturers enter in partnerships in some cases with retailers and there is an even exchange in communication. These can represent the most successful of outcomes…..some manufacturers….. many, have just circumvented the retailer altogether going straight to the web and their customers are finding them.

Like the story of Adele, the British singer who won the Grammy for Best New Artist. Adele circumvented the establishment, and American Idol and got her start on My Space. She is a legend on more than one level and she is only the tip of this iceberg. Adele is the flip side to Bernie Madoff and his ilk. She is the flip side to GM and those who have become too big to fail. Sorry Adele if I am putting too much on your plate, but really……Adele is one of the superpowers I wrote about a few posts ago. She took the place of Amy Winehouse, someone we all put our faith in who showed she wasn’t up to the task. Sorry, Amy, next? Arrive Adele.

It’s a cautionary tale for many of us, the point arriving in some cases too late. Wonder how the history books will define this era? Obamanomics as opposed to Reaganomics? Hardly. I remember the 80’s. The kinds of shifts we are experiencing right now are far more significant than what transpired in the 80’s. In the 80’s there was an almost coming of age thought process as the many boomers shifted from the wild ones to the drivers of commerce.

Here we are having massive global meltdowns, whole industries, jobs disapppearing and especially the American way of life threatened. Truthfully, it’s because we all became too complacent. I can almost feel the fat globules on my thighs thickening thinking about it. Perhaps in the end we will all have found this a necessary evil, a metamorphisis that will only result in better things to come. The process hasn’t been, isn’t fun but necessary for real progress and sustained growth.

I am not advocating throwing the baby out with the bath water. Some things in this country actually worked and served us well. Manufacturing, to my way of thinking, is actually one of them. I am not of the mind that we should be shifting all of our manufacturing overseas.

Is that a strategy that serves only to feed the beast of someone’s fear of failure, in the process ridding a country of the tangible forms of progress? In the Industrial Age, the wagon trains gave way to the railway and whole industries grew as a result.

In this great period of upheaval, what represents the wagon train and what represents the railway? What’s the marker? The internet vs the retailer?

The wagon train came to be obsolete as an example. Will the retailer become obsolete? In other words traveling did not become obsolete, so neither will shopping, shipping did not become obsolete, we still have to get from point A to point B so the railway made all kinds of things possible that the wagon train just wasn’t capable of: speed and safety are two things that immediately come to mind. It’s probably not too far out of the realm to consider that one day we will be able to just dissolve cellular matter to instantaneously get things where we want them to be. Star Trek for real.

We are in the midst of a great shift, we’ve had many starts and failures along these lines in our attempts to incorporate the internet and technology into our human lives.

At the heart of all change though, it is the human that drives it, not the other way around. And to that end humans are fallible. To create a God out of Google is just one more mistake this world will be making since well there’s always Microsoft…..and to create a God out of Twitter is akin to creating a God out of Juicy Couture: in other words our love affair with it will take many shapes and forms before it becomes a permanent part of the landscape.

image from chromaisa

We need to identify our permanent markers. There’s a shift alright but where to? For the sake of the retailers I hope they are giving this matter some real thought because life is no longer what it used to be. What many of us are going through right now is so significant that our minds and our habits and thought processes will be permanently altered. To think that that is not the case means that you, someone, is still in that bubble and it’s just a matter of time before it bursts. So don’t kid yourself. This time around, there isn’t a soul on this earth who won’t be impacted by the change that is upon us. It may be a matter of time before it all shakes out, but mark my words, we are in the process of an evolutionary change.

Maybe this is too sweeping of a statement to make, and yet, whoever would have thought that there would be no Lehman Brothers, possibly no General Motors? Do you really think you are safe from the changes that are taking place?

Let’s not be afraid. Just embrace it, and change accordingly. My words are as much to the current captains of industry and goverments as well as to the individual on the street.

Exciting isn’t it?

To that end, Trendbites will endeavor to chronicle those changes as they emerge anywhere and everywhere. It’s such an historical moment, and this time I’m not going to miss it.

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1902 Auguste Rodin, The Thinker.

If you weren’t a little ADD from this past presidential election cycle then by the time the year was up and $700 billion of tax money seemingly disappeared with no result, surely you felt you’d left a little of your brains on a sidewalk somewhere.

And if not then, perhaps the stock markets daily hissy fits have set you atwirl and your mind into its own kind of hissy fit….

Then came the holidays which for all their wonderfulness tend to test the nerves of even the best of us at moments.

Well then, I’ve got some recommendations for creating the focus we will all need to address the new year, this new year– 2009, be at one with ourselves again at the very least and come up with some of our own brilliant solutions at best.

Read on McDuff here…..(and it’s a list too!)….from EcoSalon, 24 Simple Effective Ways to Quiet Your Mind in 24 Hours or Less.

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On Christmas Day I wrote a blog post on 2modern’s design blog about Typography, ’cause, if you haven’t already noticed, it’s (typography) design’s new darling…..

Then Voila! there’s December’s British Vogue titled Fantastic Fashion Fantasy with all kinds of my favorite things all wrapped up in one issue. “Through the generations there are visionaries who conjure fabulous creations that go beyond the boundaries of the imagination.” And this is an understatement. It was, in my estimation, British Vogue’s Christmas present to me. All for a mere $10.99.

And if per chance you didn’t catch the issue, call them to get a copy (I know for my British friends, this is last year’s news and more than a few of you didn’t care for Kate Moss on the cover, again, but my love of this issue has to do with the typography as well as pulling some of the decade’s most creative fashions together in a crazy wonderful photo montage among other things). Besides creating these incredibly creative, and imaginative pages ( Unbelieveable Fashion, photographed by Nick Knight, above, Where the Wild Things Are photographed by Patrick Demarchelier, below), you can catch Nick Knight’s video of his shoot, Fantasia, at Showtimestudio.com. From the credits it looks as if Epilogue Imaging did the digital artwork for the magazine issue, which I take means that oh so cool typography.

There’s more in there, much more….it was all just so delish I couldn’t help but give the issue some space on my blog. For someone like me who craves visual creativity, this has been my double chocolate mousse cheesecake with chocolate cookie crust and white chocolate and whipped creme on top (in case you are wondering, I had that too during my holidays….my holidays were great by the way, how were yours?).

I loved the editor’s letter too: “Forget the It-bag, the serviceable coat, the investment buy; this is all about how extraordinary things can be–a celebration of the unusual.” Given the times, Ms. Alexander Shulman (British Vogue’s editor), this seems like a wise course of action.

As a final note, as if all of the above weren’t enough, Karl Lagerfield chimed in with Karl Lagerfield’s Secret Ball (above). I did not have to be at a glam mystery ball to get the best of what this might be about, Lagerfield’s paintings were enough for me!

I think this one’s a keeper. What do you think?

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Analyzying the Google data on Trendbites dashboard was an interesting exercise this morning. I wanted to know what was on people’s minds not just for the month but for the whole year and then their patterns throughout the year. Of course you have to take different things into consideration but let’s use some lists to cut to the chase.

Top Searched subjects for 2008 on the Trendbites blog:

1) Tattoos
2) Eco friendly water bottles.
3) Sarah Palin’s Wardrobe, designers and where can get it
4) Suzanis
5) Fretwork

Each one of these search terms can be elaborated upon because people used various terms to find info on these subject matters plus I would say that there were related items that fell into a sidebar of those topics, such as in fretwork also came Asian ornamintation….cloisone, champleve, etc., and they searched Benjamin Crutzfeldt’s name or his porcelain which is based on 18th century Chinese porcelain techniques but modernized.

As well several of these were either spiked by the news media, i.e., Palin’s wardrobe and this summer’s newsworthy research on the chemical in plastic water bottles being unsafe for people.

The very interesting one is that the tattoo subject is pretty consistent (throughout the year) as is fretwork, and suzanis…..a more recent though I expect timely for several reasons is the new Spring pattern for Pfaltzgraff’s dinnerware, Fruit Bounty. The Macys/Rwanda Project is also a big search item for December.

The remaining five of the top ten had to do more with star power, i.e., angelina jolie (who had more searches than Brad Pitt, fyi) but most of those searches came when they were getting ready to have their twins.

Then there was Heidi Klum’s red dress by John Galliano for the American Heart Association and Coke Sweepstakes promotion during the Oscars….again news timing.

And lots of searches for different industry color trends, a few in general trends for 2009-2010, BTS/BTC Dorm info searches, and finally named designer searches i.e., Oscar del la Renta, Dior, Moschino, Ralph Lauren and Nau (menswear for 2009 and the color of orange was searched specifically). I had a few for the timourous beasties wall paper and Scott Hill furnishings, the wallpaper or even furnishings from the movie Lucky #Slevin, and a few for the artists Damien Hirst and Richard Prince.

These searches can all be qualified by #1, I write about these items, #2, these are the things on people’s minds either professionally or because the news has spiked interest (TREND), or, and this one is special just because I went through the same thing, #3, very little otherwise is written about them such as Mumenshance the mime troupe from Switzerland. So they are one of the top five consistent trends but I know that that is a very special interest topic, not a trend per se.

Those top five as I listed them above are worth your consideration. My own bottom line is that if I wanted to make this a blog just about color trends and color per se in many industry categories, I would do very well with the blog….but hey all you out there I do write trends about color in depth and that info can be gotten in a much more specific manner, i.e., I use acutal pantone numbers by industry or even can create palettes!

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Mixing more than a few of my favorite things, art, fashion, sculpture, and exotic paper….well, you can’t get much better than this. And, I guess that’s what the folks at Kate’s Paperie in Soho, New York also understood when they asked Zoe Bradley to create one of her, one of a kind window installations for them.

Just in time for New York’s fashion week, Kate’s Paperie unveiled Ms. Bradley’s installation with an opening reception September 5th (I am so sorry I missed it, Ms. Bradley was on hand to answer questions!). Ms. Bradley’s installation, named “Hanging Japanese Gardens” is made with luxurious Yuzen papers and can be viewed ongoing at Kate’s Paperie 72 Spring Street store in Soho, New York. Kate’s Paperie is legendary for their specialty papers and journals, it’s a match made in paper heaven.

Ms. Bradley’s other clients include Donna Karan, Harvey Nichols, Selfridges (pictured above), among others, but getting her start with Alexander McQueen producing one off pieces of clothing and hats made out of paper is what convinced her that creating art from paper was her trademark. The rest is history. Her website is chock full of incredible past exhibitions, editorial works, window installations, and fashions all out of paper.

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“>Sea Orchestra.Surely awards will be won if not already. Surely these will set off a flurry of animation in commericals the likes of which have not been seen ever.

United hired international teams of animators, musicians, artists and directors from India to South Africa to Norway to France to China to create these masterpieces. Robert Redford is the voice over (I knew I recognized that voice). Their pr spin reads “New ads create an artistic interpretation of the emotions travelers feel when flying United’s new international service.”

So if artistic mastery weren’t enough, they launched them during the Olympics. Sea Orchestra, featured above, was first shown during the Opening Ceremony which is when I saw it and only a commercial like this could break through the spectacular nature of what the Olympic Opening Ceremony turned out to be.

“>Two Worlds. Then yesterday, Sunday, I saw the second one, “Two Worlds” which takes you from a black and white scenario (again animated) to one with color. You can’t miss the ads though, right, besides being visually arresting they have these catchy little customized versions of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” performed by the L.A. Philharmonic. In Sea Orchestra a United airplane crosses the ocean and
is serenaded by an orchestra of animated sea creatures that are playing a
unique version of Rhapsody in Blue using tubas, violins, French horns and
the Indonesian gamelan. The score was created by Shy the Sun, a South
Africa-based directing team, which used hand-drawn textures, computer
animation characters and photographs of water, reefs and skies. The Two Worlds commercial combines two different and distinctive animation styles created by directors SSSR, a Norwegian and Japanese team, who was responsible for the monochromatic world that was mostly computer-generated with a hand-crafted feel, and Gaelle Denis, a French director, who was responsible for the colorful
fantasy world that uses using live action, computer generation and matte
paintings, including textures such as Japanese rice paper.

So, I did read where the campaign “It’s time to fly,” created by ad agency BDM has earned the Gold Effie Award for marketing effectiveness and was nominated for an Emmy Award. I’ll say.

You can’t beat the timing. That alone is brilliant since what they are advertising is United’s new international first and business class service with flat bed seating. If the flying is as comfortable as these commercials make it look, then they win all around, regardless. It’s first class advertising not to mention international in nature (which is what really makes it all fly) and launched with not just one but 5 different spots to be aired during the Olympics where you get more international eyeballs than any other venue at one time.

Bravo BDM. Bravo United. Bravo Marketing Team. I’m on board. It’s time to fly!

(for more on the teams and intent behind each of the commercials go here and to see the rest of the new ads go here).

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I don’t usually read InStyle any more, but the August issue held some unique tipping points, such as Rhianna’s tatoos which are some of the most alluring and well done I’ve seen to date.

That’s not to say there is anything wrong with the other type, but Rhianna gives us chickens (those who have yet to committ to getting one) some designs that allow for a certain amount of rebellion and discretion at the same time.

There are other methods now too if you don’t actually want to have your skin permanently altered by getting a real tatoo; clothing now exists to give an impression of some really heavy duty tatoos (this is interesting), Ed Hardy apparel for one, and Sleeves Clothing for another; but perhaps the most telling sign that tatoos have gone mainstream and has options is in the crafts section of Wal-Mart. You can get tatoo art to put on your skin that will of course wash off.

Where to go from here? Transfers to fabric so you can do your own style of tatoo clothing (we need the paints for that too)…I’m just sayin’.

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Austin Kleon, an Austin Tx. writer/cartoonist/designer, has developed a new art form: Newspaper Blackout Poetry. It’s more than just the design or layout of his poetry that is so fascinating, but the fact that he can look at a paragraph (or two) from an article in a newspaper and find such profound meaning. For more, go here. And, Happy Mother’s Day.

Thank you to How Magazine’s blog for the heads up on this one.

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At the Victoria & Albert Museum March 15-July 13.

Right on cue with all the controversey about goods being produced and imported from China, it’s time we see the upside to this country’s progress. The V&A exhibit explores China’s current design, art, fashion and architecture scene. Journeying along China’s east coast, the exhibit moves south to north from Shenzhen, China’s manufacturing centre, to fashion capital Shanghai and architectural hotspot Beijing.

As the country has developed so has its arts, architectural and fashion practices. ‘China Design Now’ covers some 100 designers set to influence the international stage as they establish a new norm within their own shorelines.

For more information, downloads, and to order tickets, visit the V&A’s website or to their online shop for information on or to purchase the above poster, Graphic Design in China by Chen Shaohua, or any one of the Hi Panda collectibles (small versions of the larger ones seen in the show and designed by young urban designers Shirtflag).

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PTS America is primarily a dinnerware company. You can see more of their designs by visiting their website and to find out where their products can be found. Their eco line of office supplies in my last post began in 2005 under the brand 222 DECOR……

Lunar Barbecue Dinner Plate. Atlas Salad Plate. Rosie the Riveter Mug.

But they have this great line called “Slice of Life,” (above). And that it is. The dinner and salad plates have a similar look but the particular story being told on each plate is different and can be assorted….mugs too. These would make great conversation pieces over dinner.

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