Monthly Roundup – September
What the team have been watching, listening to, and reading over the past month.
Monthly Roundup – September
5 min read
Agency
Words by Jen Barry
At the end of each month, our team catches up over some beers, to share what we have listened to, seen, experienced, read and watched.
What we saw
With cinemas and public spaces opening up again, Christopher Nolan chose to release his latest blockbuster Tenet as planned (unlike Dune and No Time To Die which are now being shelved until 2021..), but the film had us split with half of us loving it, and half thinking it might be his worst film yet.
With the first presidential candidate debate taking place, the world witnessed lies, rage, ranting and a lot of interruption (and not forgetting passing on the opportunity to condemn white supremacists…), so it feels fitting (nostalgic?) to take a trip back to when modern US politics were more inspiring with HBO’s 2018 documentary John McCain: For Whom The Bell Tolls. A beautiful film profiling the late John McCain and his 31 years in public office until he lost his battle with brain cancer.
Recent campaign from Deutsche Telekom who are targeting (to their advantage) “screen-obsessed” Gen Z. The film featuring Billie Eilish focuses on the power of digital for change summarised in her closing line, “Maybe next time they see us staring at a screen and they ask us what we’re doing on it, why don’t we show them what we’re doing with it.”
Finally, we checked out the latest exhibition at Soho House Hong Kong, DESIGN TRUST: Critically Homemade, where we featured our latest work in collaboration with Aurélien Barbry.
What we listened to
New track MANGO (feat. Adeline) from Brooklyn based poet and artist Kamauu. Influence from Thundercat without imitation.
From A Continuous Lean Podcast, conversation and insights from American businessman and investor discusses why Alex Mill feels different from the masses of DTC brands emerging – The ACL Podcast 001: Mickey Drexler
Mickey Drexler's son Alex, follows in his father's footsteps with his brand Alex Mill, promoting conscious consumerism with the ethos "Not more clothes, but the right clothes"
What we read
The Spirit of the Bauhaus. Founded as an art school in 1919 and forced to close in 1933 by the Nazis, the Bauhaus established itself as a major influence on 20th-century art and design that remains today. The book is a historical tour of the sources of inspiration that brought the Bauhaus into existence.
Guardian’s article written by GPT-3, OpenAI’s language generator and (scarily) titled: A robot wrote this entire article. Are you scared yet, human?. Very 2020.
A look at the world of DTC brands on Bloomberg in Welcome to Your Bland New World, and the blueprint that we have all come to expect, highlighting the need to have design and thinking always rooted in purpose to avoid clichés.
Humans must keep doing what they have been doing, hating and fighting each other. I will sit in the background, and let them do their thing.
Next
Monthly Roundup – August
September, 2020.
