Wieden+Kennedy Tokyo Review
I’ve now finished with Wieden+Kennedy and just about Tokyo as well, I head back to London on tuesday. I’m very very sad to be leaving the team, as I’ve had such a fantastic time, working really hard and learning lots from working closely with the creative director, Eric. The book I have been working on since I started, is now just about ready for printing with a final approval and paper choices to be made now. The web work is completed, and I will be finishing off the mobile project and T-shirt back in London which is great news. Eric has taught me a lot about refining work to make it look the best it can be, as well thinking conceptually throughout the design process. He has been there and done that, so it’s been a interesting learning experience by a great mentor.
The W+K Tokyo team are a fantastic bunch of people to work with, all from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines which makes up the Tokyo melting pot, full of energy, creativity and a hybrid mix. So a massive thanks goes out to Eric of course, and everyone else; Sumiko, Jose, Kumiko, Naoki, Shingo, Hiromi, Akio, Phil, Andrew, Kenji, Yoshi, Shun, Yuko, Yumiko, Trish, John, Yohei, Tomoko, Mae, Kuki, Yuko, Shig, Keiko, Shane, Genki, Takeshi, Mark, Dai, Jorta, Shuhei, Michiyo, Yoko, Ayumi, Kanako, Nagisa, Chucky, Emily, Mag, Shinji and the other interns Andrea, Erika and Bobby for making my time at W+K so enjoyable. Apologies for everyone else, I’m good with names, but not that good.
July itself started off very quickly as I helped out on an all nighter which was a good experience to go through, even though I wasn’t of much help, I did a few bits here and there. This was then followed by the CLASKA Flea Market which I posted about at the beginning of the month. July kept up it’s pace, with the last two weeks, being long work hours, but worth it. Other highlights of the month have included when GRAPH came in. GRAPH are a design and printing company who specialise in high end printing techniques and production and brought in some amazing examples of work they have designed, as well as printing methods examples. Everything from heat sensitive paper for hair styling products to a book embedded into a cardboard holder. GRAPH gave W+K as well as myself some inspiration for further projects and showed just how far you can push printing and finishing techniques.
Then on the thursday just gone, we had the W+K Tokyo Summer Party. The Tokyo based radio station, OUTTANET Radio broadcast live from the 4th floor as everyone hit the roof for beers and an amazing Japanese style BBQ; 8 beers later I headed back down to my desk to finish up some work! Check out the blog posts about the BBQ here and OUTTANET here.
So I’ve learnt loads being with W+K, and soaked up the culture of Tokyo as much as I could of since being here at the beginning of May. I will definitely be coming back in the near future and I wish everyone in the team the very best until I see them all again. Eric also gave me the W+K LAB Tokyo Ten and New Tokyo Life Style Think Zone books as a thank you and I left everyone a box of Yorkshire Tea and a book on how to be British (most of the time no one could understand what I was saying). You can see all of the photos I have taken since being in Tokyo on my Flickr page here.
First week at Wieden+Kennedy
I’ve had internships so far with Print Club, Not Actual Size, Pentagram Berlin, Cunning and THIS IS Studio on my year out and now I am in Tokyo on my 6th internship at the creative and prolific agency Wieden+Kennedy. Now living in Tokyo along with being in Berlin previously have been and will be great learning curves looking back on London during my year out, which in a few weeks time, last year, was when it all began.
So I arrived in Tokyo last Thursday and the first week at W+K has flown by; Tokyo is really growing on me. The studio is located in Roppongi, generally known for being the sleaze area which come night is the case, but during the day it’s a great location to be working in. The studio itself is a behemoth of a five floored building and I am working in Eric Cruz’s (the creative director, who I set the placement up with) team on the first floor alongside all the other art directors. The rest of the designers are down in the basement which is a great space also. I am also working alongside Andrea, the other intern from Switzerland, so it’s nice being able to share my thoughts on projects and ideas with her as well.
This week I’ve been put straight into action which is great and what I hoped for, working on a cover and contents page for a book and mobile phone skin designs for W+K LAB (the music label run alongside the agency projects); something that I have never done before so it’s good to be learning about that at the same time. Today we had a massive new identity brief. The whole agency attended and I listened via a translator which was a new experience for me as well. I finished off the week with a quick design for a postcard for another client, presented already later in the evening. Like this, everything at W+K and Tokyo in general seems to go a million miles at once. I’ve got lots on for next week already.
I’ll have some more stories from Tokyo soon and of course the monthly reviews of W+K so watch this space. An ongoing set of photographs I’m taking including more shots of the W+K studio can be found on my Flickr page here, so enjoy. Finally, a blog entry about me and the rest of the new faces at W+K Tokyo can be found on their blog here.
V&A Fashion V Sport Exhibition
Last night I went to the Fashion V Sport exhibition at the V&A. I was really looking forward to seeing this one as I’m a huge fan of sport, and the clothes that go along with it. There were some interesting fashion pieces and custom garments on show, along with a Chanel surfboard and a great display case of trainers, but in general it was a disappointing exhibition, certainly not even worth the £3 pounds I paid with student discount to get in.
You can see the exhibition link on the V&A website here.
NIKE Sportswear Presented…..Kate Moross
The second of the screen printing talks/demos at the Nike 1948 pop up store, this time by Camberwell graduate Kate Moross. A quick visit during lunch on Tuesday while I was at the Blyk workshop. And I picked up one of Kate’s nice prints.
The full set of THIS IS Studio and Kate Moross’ demos are on my Flickr page here.
Digesting Design 
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