The Hair Paradox

To be hairy or not to be hairy, that’s the question. It’s an urban myth that only women are vain, men are vain too, only their means of expression are different. Take for instance facial hair, it offers an excellent opportunity to mark that you are a unique and interesting person. Facial hair can even be a means of identity, how many beard styles are not named after a famous person that wore it? I.e. the Clark Gable pencil moustache. Beard-styles are of all times.

Intelligent Life, Summer 2011, Moustaches

In the not so distant past men that worked in offices had clean shaven faces; proving they where clean and hygienic, taking good care of themselves. The clean shaven face being a symbol of neatness and civilization.

But recently facial hair has become a real statement; famous is the full unkempt Buddha beard of Rick Rubin, music industry executive at Sony. It says “even though I’m an executive I don’t have to act like one; I’m actually a laid back relaxed hippie”. The full beard has recently become more and more popular; it’s a sign of the so-called menaissance, men demanding back masculinity, the right to be a real man.

Rick Rubin

Paradoxically in parallel at the same time body-hair is disappearing, maybe fuelled by the Philips body groomer? At least body-hair for men for the moment seems to be going through the same eradication that facial hair went through earlier. You show up with body hair in the shower after sports, then you are a not taking good care of yourself, not cultivating your body.

So the wearing of hair for men seems to have been turned upside-down, we are now going through the phase of smooth body and lots of facial hair. The question is if and when it will turn around again? The popularity of Mad Men and their neat and smooth faces together with the recent reports of the rise of the male barber salons suggests that we might be going towards taking removing facial really serious and the rebirth of the barber rituals as a moment for men to treat themselves, and recent numbers show that the barber-business is thriving in the shrinking economy.

Mad Men

F.S.C. Barber on Horatio Street in the West Village.
Joshua Bright for New York Times

One thing is for sure men are taking their appearance dead serious and the opportunity for brands to grow to really serve the genuine needs of men in this area is big, don’t forget that under all that hair there is a skin that is crying for attention and treatment too.

Published in edited form in Philips New Value News, August, in Design Trends

Swap economy

Could we be facing the end-of-money? Will we still need money as a mode of exchange in the new networking society? And how much more stuff do we need to buy with money? These seem to all be relevant questions in the current economic crisis. Reason enough for me at least to attend a local swap-market "ruilmarkt" that was held recently in the neighborhood.

I was impressed with the entrepreneurship and creativity displayed by these two girls that took initiative. They have used Facebook to "flyer" the event, spread the word. The little square had little stalls all with their own little angle to the swapping. There was the swap-musician, swap-restaurant and swap-experiences, so it wasn't simply only swapping goods, it was also swapping services.

It is really interesting to see how approaches that in the recent past where only adopted by the counter-culture movements now seem to be adopted by the bigger mass of people. When I first saw the note of this event, I thought, ok another anti-establishment initiative. So I was really positively surprised, the two girls that took initiative simply said, that they thought they had enough, so why not swap?

Of course we all know the swap-parties we, particularly girls, hold with our girl-friends every now and then to swap clothes. Or if you are a crafter; swapping yarn, because you always tend to have or buy too much.

But could this become a serious new business model or economic model? Certainly people like Otto van Busch has deep-dived into the topics of over-consumption of particularly fashion and the in principle suppressive system of fashion-renwal. In a playful way he has held swap- and repair parties in galleries and musea to test different modus of swapping and up-cycling. By stopping participation in the fashion-system you can unleash empowerment and creativity. In the arts and counter-culture movements many ways have been explored to create an alternative economic system; for example the simple "give-away" shops.

HUT by Carin van Dongen, Su Thomsen and Hans Josso

Do we see here the birth of a new economic model? A different sort of give-and-take economy, empowered by the social web, and fueled by the economic crisis. Time-is-money certainly more than ever seems to be a statement that comes from the industrial age. Maybe the new currency will have more to do with how connected you are. Your level of connectivity will be determining for how well you can spread the word and therefore connect peers to peers. and that network is of course going to be worth. money.

Pop-up Lab

Pop-up seems to have taken a new turn. Or have come back to its guerilla roots perhaps? At least my short-term memory tells me about all the (big) brands that have taken advantage of pop-up to create some buzz for their brands. See the Nivea pop-up now already running for 5 years in Milan etcetc. Also some elitist brands like Prada (foundation) hijacked pop-up and turned into artist elitist  shops in the middle of nowhere or starchitect designed circulating pavilions. But here's the new Pop-up, a testing lab for young entrepreneurs or maybe just even people that want to test if their hobby and passion holds up for real business. What also characterizes these young entrepreneurs; they generate interest and promote their business using Facebook . It's for free, and much less difficult than creating a real website. In their shops you find a special mix of niche-brands of all sorts, music, fashion, art, interior alike. It's almost as if this is a personal fingerprint of their own taste. They create these ideas and places because they feel that something is missing, what they like is not there, they respond by making it available.

Wood-Wood pop-up store in Voorstraat, Utrecht

The two girls; Klijs and Boon have kick-started their Nordic fashion-shop with a summer trial-sales of the brand WoodWood. The theme of this temporary summer shop is Cardboard, and it's all over. Firstly it makes it look like the shop is there just for a moment, and that's also what it says on the posters and flyers. It gives the shop that temporary, ephemeral character of just-here-right-now, gone-in-a-sec. It also makes it look as if we had just walked into a factory sale, goods have just been delivered, straight out of the boxes, prices must be affordable a bit like a solde-de-presse in Paris. Lastly it's of course a cheap way of making a creative interior design. And praise to the girls here, it is very creative, just take a look at these pictures.

By the way the shop will not end in August as they say it will continue, they will expand the brands they carry; Acne and Henrik Vibskov will be part of the collection. They will be different from the rest of Utrecht fashion retail by having a younger target (by comparison Zolamanola is somewhat older) the brands and collections will reflect a Nordic lifestyle, and there will be an edge of androgyny to it. Or Boyfriendslook. Or Tomboys, as they aim at making the same stuff available for both girls and boys.

B E D F O R D
open for just one month, the two people who run the initiative took holidays or gave themselves evening-shifts for one month in order to be able to run it. They managed to run 4 different shows during that period, each with an opening on friday night of an artist duo, of course with a grand opening party with music and drinks. The music / DJ offers his mix on Mixtapes @ Soundcloud.com. In Bedford art, music and fashion comes together in a curated match. Besides from the art-duo-exhibition there is also a store that offers furniture, books, t-shirts and edgy fashion. Bedford perfectly illustrates the idea of creative entrepreneurship. It curates the space to a personal idea of what is their extraordinary menu, everything offered is creative, edgy and off the beaten path, but's still pop and comprehensible enough to be just cool, you would instantly want to wear that or house that in your living-room to be cool too.

 

Cupboards by Jifke Heijster

Hannekes boom
suddenly one day it was there, it looks like it has been constructed in an overnight hurry. Just as you would raise an illegal construction on an abandoned lot. But Hannekes Boom is not in a random place it occupies a corner of the Eastern harbor of Amsterdam where boats have been harboring since 1662.  it might look temporary, but it's there to stay, for at least five years I have been told.
The building and all the interior has been constructed using salvaged material, urban debris. Though some of it looks more like it came from the beach. It's all very slammed together and a patchwork of what almost seems random materials. The bar-chairs are 3 beer-crates held together with a roadstrap, and raw treetrunks seem to be carrying the roof. There are rough edges a plenty here, artistic graffiti illustrations decorating the toilet-doors, and Hannekes praises itself to be the new cultural hotspot. On the website Hannekes talks a lot about the history of the place as well as the authentic food. Last I must say was a bit of a disappointment.

More natural than nature?

That natural means untouched, unadulterated and pure seems obvious. But natural, the state of being and looking natural has become so desirable that people are increasingly going out-of-their way to create it and to achieve it. We call that natural constructed.

In beauty we see that more and more people, salons and brands are striving to represent, communicate and be natural. First of all we see that brands leave out harmful substances like parabens or aluminum chlorohydrate and phthalates, even very mainstream brands like Sanex and Dove are starting to do this today and L’oreal recently launched a hair-die without ammoniac; INOA, so now hair can be colored without aggression to the scalp.
Natural ingredients are taking over in beauty product.  Herb extracts and essential oils are replacing ingredients and perfumes and natural oils are being used for hair-treatments i.e. from the argan tree or macadamia nuts. Hair gets healthy treatments like massage to stimulate the blood-circulation of the scalp to revive the hair-follicles. It’s all about feeding your hair to make it more healthy, glossy and voluminous. That equals Natural.
When it comes to make-up the natural or nude look is hot. You might think that means no make-up, but not in this case; it means carefully applying make-up that is all natural colors, to make you look like your better natural self. There are even foundations that contain natural minerals that allegedly improve the health of your skin whilst you wear it. Also foundations have become so light that it’s currently being delivered like a mousse, miles away from the cakes from the past. Make-up is turning aquarelle.

Bare Escentuals - Active soil complex

Bare Escentuals - Bare Minerals

Bare Escentuals - shop impression

So it takes effort to appear natural. It can take hours to create your natural look.
We think it’s a reaction to the recession, and all the glam and opulence that we had before it. Being natural represents the idea of a new cleaned up and pure state-of-mind. It’s more relaxed and casual (or so it seems). It suggests living in a more modest setting, causing less harm and costing less money.
We anticipate that beauty-products and treatments will get closer and closer to the edible as what is edible cannot be harmful to the body and skin. If it’s good for the inside it must be good for the outside too. So food and beauty will start to integrate and become on system or approach that are closely connected. We already see a lot of beauty-food i.e. like Borba and collagen drinks, and Aveda branded salons also house cafe's that reflect identical values.

Beauty is going to be a reflection of general health & wellbeing, the challenge for Philips will be to deliver product/service solutions that support, enhance or strengthen the natural systems involved in beautification. Seems like the most natural thing to do.

Published in edited form in trends section of New Value News by Philips Design July 2011

Etsyfication?

The long tail of the creative economy swept over Utrecht in the Pentecostal weekend. Both House aan de Werf and Fabrique had set-up market and shops to sell crafted, small-scale, creative even at times artistic goods. The coming-up of the creative market as a place to hang-out in the Whit break. And maybe to buy something, get access to something rare and special that not many other people have, meet the artist, meet the web-shop owner who's otherwise hidden behind the screen.

Huis aan de Werf market, weekend winkel/shop; 10,11,12 June 2011 (whit sunday and monday)
The market here felt more like a carefully curated exhibition. The choice of artists and craftsmen was complimentary in an interesting way and with a contemporary expression of spontaneity and fragility in sketches and a sort of  scavenged or re-purposed materials. A high note of DIY both in expression but also in the emerging 3D printing techniques as with the vases by Joris van Tubergen.

1€perminute design by Joris van Tubergen

1€perminute design by Joris van Tubergen

De Hippe Markt in the Gifpark, Utrecht, organized by Fabrique. A market for 55 creative webshops, where young designers and webshops that source special brands can present their products. A much more family oriented event, probably also as it was situated in the childrens playground of the Gifpark. This seemed more like a typical market, you-pay-for-a-stand, you-get-to-expose, looked like nothing had been curated here, maybe except for trying to group similar stands closer to each other. The level of artisanship was lower, yet there was creativity in how some sellers have re-purposed t-shirts etcetc, but all immediately done in quite vast quantities, which makes it seem less special. Items for sale where also more regular every-day items like hats, t-shits and interior accessories.

Interesting to see the coming-up of the creative markets also in Utrecht, it made me think there must be loads of these little Crafters all around me, also just in my neighborhood. Such a pity that there is not more visibility of this when you walk through the streets. and I would be curious to hear if and how these people can make a living of their creative products.