Gabby and Laura’s word

GL: Tuesday was a big night for adland. Whether you were in London or in the Singapore, both cities hosted two of the biggest nights in the advertising calendar. As we couldn’t pick one event over the other, Laura and I have decided to split ‘word’ between us and deliver to you a snippet of each. 

 

Spikes Asia 2012 – My first experience of the awards and hopefully not my last. Spread and neatly packaged over the course of three days the event manages to entice the cream of Asian advertising to Singapore’s Suntec Building where they don’t only watch and see the best work from their region, but are also able to listen to some truly engaging content from agencies and brands across the region. Seminars that stood out for me and truly held my attention: Lowe and Partners: Creating change – How Brave Are You? BBDO’s Andrew Robertson: Would Dicken’s have tweeted? AKQA’s Rei Inamoto: The Future of Advertising isn’t Advertising and Hakuhodo’s 1+1=3: A Formula for Creative Alchemy. Ogilvy & Mather’s debate with David Mayo, James Thompson and Todd Solondz was organised by OgilvyDo their home for ideas, insight and inspiration. You can watch the debate and several inspiring interviews they captured at the event by visiting their website.

 

During the course of the week, I saw some pretty amazing work and it’s no surprise to me, when David Mayo, in his ‘5 Minutes With…’ interview last week mentioned that Asia advertising is now exporting its work outside the region. Personal favourite’s have to be Ogilvy Shanghai’s work for Coca Cola which won Gold, JWT’s Radio prank for Lux which won radio grand prix and film grand prix winner ‘What does your mind see?’ for Samsung from Cheil Worldwide. BBDO deservedly won network of the year, with Party Tokyo named independent agency of the year and Mindshare Mumbai sweeping media agency of the year. Definitely worth watching when it comes onto the events site is the address from Ogilvy’s regional CCO Eugene Cheong. He cleverly drew on examples of famous historical creatives to highlight a sequence of habits that can be conducive to creative thinking.  

 

Party wise… well, I had to rush off to catch my flight to Hong Kong, but I gather from my friend and Singaporean host, McCann’s regional growth officer, Richard Newman that it was a night to remember – photos on the site seem to highlight this. 

 

For me, I got my glad rags out on Monday night for the agency parties; McCann WG’s live session, which saw members of the agency sing and perform, was genius and set a great mood on their impressive rooftop. Lowe’s street party, complete with a rock-a-billy theme and dancers, thoroughly entertained me, as did the ever charming and very nice, Jose Miguel Sokoloff who exchanged ‘air con’ cold symptoms with me and suggested I overdose on Hershey’s dark chocolate drops – the man is a genius. Special thanks have to be mentioned to my chaperone for the evening, DraftFCB’s Stephen Martincic and James Mok who not only ensured I always had a drink, but put up with my cold induced ramblings and lethargy. It’s a short period of time, but those Spikes guys know how to pack a day or three and I can highly recommend attending – certainly, you must check out the work on their site. 

 

Next week, I’ll be back in the UK and discussing my time here in Singapore… For now, here’s Laura, my amazing and much more amusing colleague who’ll get you up to speed on D&AD. 

 

A view from our table... and is that Jonathan Ive's head photobombing our shot in the corner?

 

LS: Gabby hasn’t been the only one of the LBB team to spot Jose Miguel Sokoloff. He’s also been in London to pick up the hugely coveted Black Pencil at this week’s D&AD show for the impressive – and important – Rivers of Light campaign for the Colombian Ministry of Defence by Lowe SSP3 Colombia.

 

Dan Wieden was honoured with the 2012 President’s Award, demonstrating (as if proof was ever needed) the exquisite taste of the Pres Du Jour, Rosie Arnold. Talking of whom, I think I might be developing a bit of a girl crush.

 

Neville Brody took to the stage to announce the launch of the D&AD Foundation, which will support creative education in the UK and beyond, and it will be interesting to see how that initiative develops.

 

It wasn’t any old annual D&AD show – this year the grand dame of shows opened its pencil case to explore the most awarded work from the past fifty years. Legendary CDP was named best advertising agency of the past 50 years, with Gorgeous taking the gong for most awarded production company, and Apple (who else?) topping the table for Design. With Tony Kaye clambering up on all fours to collect his Pencil for top director (which he shared with Frank Budgen), Sir Jonathan Ive sitting at the freaking table next to ours (!) and designer Derek Birdsall being honoured with the special, 50th Anniversary President’s Award the show was a celebration of the timelessness of good design. 

 

De La Soul may have been treating the gathered crowd to a rendition of Me, Myself and I, but witnessing the people of advertising and design celebrate our the ground breaking creators I was struck by the sense of community that ties the industry together. I had a warm fuzzy feeling inside – and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t entirely due to the wine…