Learning journal: Fashion Media Laboratory. TERM2

My learning activities during the Term 2 kept me really busy working on two written pieces for Fashion Media Laboratory, attending additional technical workshops and most importantly, producing our "Synesthesia" project, a digital web-site..

January 8
I already knew i'd be in team with Olya and Poon and was really excited about it.
We had to wait till Olya arrives so we can collect our thoughts and come up with some innovative idea for a web-site or an application. To me, it was a bit too many things going on straight after a break. However, looking back it seems very nice we had this wave of university responsibilities going on.
Though, to me, it is a huge challenge to work with digital content, as I am not so capable of developing internet projects, as in, write codes, etc.

January 15
Olya already arrived and we had a few ideas and also some time to narrow them down to just one.
Thomas helped us by explaining the roles that exist within these kind of projects so we could start thinking of what each of us can bring to the table.

January 22
As we went with Olya's initial idea about "Synesthesia" it was not so clear to some of us of what we'd be doing. Olya was an art-director and she said she'd be doing styling, asked me to. I couldn't force myself towards trying and captivating that part of the production, although it's basically the only thing i can do, except for art directing, and i couldn't because it was her idea.
Poon also felt lost with his responsibilities, and we then gave up trying to find a role we aren't interested in. Because it seems a waste of time if I take part in it and I don't care about it. The idea was so good that it'd've been a shame to lose it by doing something you don't wanna be credited for.
I told Olya that that'll do nothing to my portfolio if I'd be a producer, I'd not mention it neither on my web-site nor anywhere else, if it's nothing to do with my personal growth. Of course, I'd do it, it's a brief, but that'd be a shame. So in the end, I ended up being a producer and a fashion director, and ultimately a stylist.

January 25
I got in touch with all the brands we wanted to work with, found emails, telephone numbers. But my past good experiences with Fred Perry helped me to get the brand interested in our brief. I am really proud of it.
And we also continued meeting with Olya and Poon every week. It's great Olya has been so supportive, despite the fact we had to bring our ideas into her original idea and sometimes change her mind.
I was not really scared about not getting the clothes, the studio, models for our shoot. That's what producer does, and that's what I do when i push my own ideas.. but the closer it was getting to the deadline, the more nerve-wrecking it was becoming..


February 5
I could not attend, because I had a photo shoot on my own (had 3 throughout that month) and had to skip unfortunately. But meanwhile, i saw a busy time 'off school coming the week after and I aimed to finish two essays, one for contextual studies and one for FML, so everything was very busy.
However, I managed to collect samples of Fred Perry and ask for more to come, when we noticed a lack of necessary colours..
I also booked a studio, we had to move the date, due to a tight budget, and because the studio was the only option we could afford. So instead of shooting on 13th of February, we had to reschedule to February, 20.

February 12

We had a great and exciting workshop with Thomas that helped me a lot with InDesign and Unity. It started to really get interesting because before that I was still a bit lost.

February 19

By the time of the class, I already had 4 models confirmed. Despite the fact, 2 had to be changed last minute, the day after we had a shoot anyway and we had to be ready. I had a studio and 3 heavy bags of Fred Perry at home.
We gave a presentation on what we have so far.
Income of the session was really positive, as Thomas's idea to have a tune for each picture. and so when we'd hover over the particular colour, it'd produce sound from that tune but stripped down to one instrument.
I really thought it was a great idea and especially that Olya felt worried that we have Fred Perry, who are very specific in their brand identity and might dislike our original idea of the simple sound. We thought of something more rock, would fit the web-site.

Then we discussed it, and I suggested my help with sound, as my friend has a studio and records music professionally, so we are settled to go there on Monday.

After the class we went to my place and checked the clothes, we thought of how the garments can work together for our idea..Guys were kind enough to take two of the bags and bring the next day

February, 20
The morning started early. At 6 AM.
Despite the fact there was a long way, it's a studio in Custom House, DLR line, I was doing well and would have arrived on time.
I am a producer and it's important. And all the call-sheets would give my contact to all the agents of the models and everyone else.
The booked make up artist came on time, and Olya as well.. The models were late more or less.. But I had to stay at home to wait for emails of the agents, because they called me last minute saying some of the models couldn't come..
So we had to change them..
One model then texted me saying he'd wait for an off-peak time because it was very expensive for him. So I suggested paying his trip, if it'd make him come earlier.
In the end, by the time I arrived, everyone was in the studio except for our photographer, Coco.
She is very good and I was excited to see how she works. She told us she'd want it very neutral and clean, in everything. And all the team ended up working under her control, I had to apologise to the MUA, because she had to re-do it a lot of times, and then the photographer ended up rearranging everything. And styling me and Olya did, also had the same thing. However, she was polite and apologised saying that's the way she works and stuff like that.
To me, that was a great shoot, however, I had to give up at least 30% of my vision to satisfy the photographer. So I was quite flexible to save nerves.

But everyone was so supportive, our team was so nice, and hardworking. At this stage I am really glad about how it's come out.

BURBERRY VS CHAVS- CALL FOR HELP

Today the brand is far from what it was back in the 00's, and its' beginning, when the company faced a huge crisis. The need to rebrand Burberry brought the new team of great professionals, including Christopher Bailey and Angela Ahrendts (retired to go to Apple last year). But how the brand was changed significantly can be proved by the sources such as LCF library, that provided me with a DVD of a BBC documentary on a problem of Burberry vs chavs.



source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4381140.stm


For a top luxury fashion company like Burberry it is the ultimate nightmare.
Their distinctive beige check, once associated with A-listers, has now become the uniform of a rather different social group: the so-called Chav.
With UK sales falling, Burberry cannot afford to become a laughing stock in their own backyard.
But just how does a top designer label shrug off a damaged image?
Only five years ago, Burberry was the darling of the fashion world after undergoing one of the most envied brand reinventions of recent years.
"It really tapped into a sense of the early years of the millennia," says Andrea Cockram of Verdict Research.
But all too quickly, the brand became a victim of its own success.
Label-conscious football hooligans started to adopt the distinctive check.
"It was associated with people who did bad stuff, who went wild on the terraces," says Peter York.
"Quite a lot of people thought that Burberry would be worn by the person who mugged them."

Welsh rap band, Goldie Lookin' Chain were given a Vauxhall Cavalier with a distinctive Burberry check paint job.
Nicknamed the "Chavalier", the car was being auctioned off on EBay until Burberry's lawyers got in touch demanding that the car be destroyed for infringing their copyright.

Burberry is moving away from its traditional check

It was not only the car that was crushed, says band member Eggsy.
"I cried when they said you've got to destroy the car. What's next? Taking Rupert the Bear to court for having trousers that looked like Burberrys?"
There was more bad news earlier this year. Kate Moss, whose recent high-profile campaigns to promote the brand made her into the face of Burberry, is now facing tabloid allegations of drug-taking.
UK phenomenon
Burberry's Chief Executive Rose Marie Bravo is stepping down next year in favour of fellow American Angela Ahrendts, and the Chavs issue is likely to be near the top of her in-tray.
But there is reason for hope.
Most of Burberry's sales are overseas, so although sales in the UK have been sliding, international profits for last year reached over £160m.
Ms Ahrendts must be hoping that Chavs don't become a global phenomenon.

---

The Money Programme - Burberry versus The Chavs: broadcast on BBC TWO at 7pm on Friday 28 October.

Musicians Burberry fashion film

The idea of a rock concert and music is well depicted in the series of the videos.
As Bailey would say to WWD, Brit is the brand's line that they want to associate with music

Christopher Bailey's playlist

The CEO of the brand gave an idea of what songs he likes and the ones he associates with the brand.

https://play.spotify.com/user/guardianmusic/playlist/6eUSlXi2RtygX04xuskEtx

BURBERRY AND SHOWS. music's influence on their live events

here are the videos depicting some of the shows that can illustrate the idea of how the industry of music and fashion collapse and create something special for Burberry- it's attractiveness and the unmistakable new brand identity.

The company invites their Burberry Acoustic's new musicians' music

They invite singers to perform during the show (Tom Odell)

The latest show, 17th of February, 2014

BURBERRY's CEO about MUSIC and their brand

Burberry's Christopher Bailey on his obsession with music

For Burberry's chief creative officer, music is so important that the company now has its own full-time music team. The designer explains how his musical obsession drives his fashion work

by Laura Barton  source: http://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2013/sep/04/christopher-bailey-music-burberry-fashion

Since his arrival at the label in 2001, Bailey has made it something of a mission to entangle the worlds of fashion and music. It's there in the soundtracks to the shows of course, but also in the brand's advertising campaigns, featuring musicians such as Bryan Ferry, Patrick Wolf and Jack Bevan from Foals, George Barnett from These New Puritans and in a series of video performances by emerging and established artists named Burberry Acoustic.

The story of how Odell came to play such a key role in last February's show is not atypical. His music had been introduced to Bailey somewhere along the line – one of the many emailed links, demos, personal recommendations he receives each week. But Bailey had found himself so quickly smitten that by the time he was planning February's catwalk show, "I was just obsessively listening to his music. And even if I was listening to something else, I was listening to something that might've been in the Tom world … do you know what I mean?" he asks, looking faintly embarrassed, sitting on the edge of the sofa in his office at Burberry headquarters in London. "That weird musical obsession that you get, like a teenager."

Bailey lined up Tom Odell to perform at the Burberry Prorsum autumn/winter show earlier this year. Photograph: Ian Gavan/Getty Images

It was, he explains, Odell's "sincerity and authenticity" that appealed. "I love that he's intense and I love that he believes in it and he's not playing at this. It's almost, I feel, more powerful than he is. It's transporting him."

When they met, he found Odell "warm, not introverted, but like a lot of musicians, quite awkward. He's not naturally gregarious and vivacious or demonstrative." But he saw too how Odell seemed to come alive when he played. "In his body language and everything – he becomes so intense and focused," Bailey says. "It's where everything kind of comes together."

There is a sweet inarticulacy to Bailey when it comes to speaking about music. "I find it very difficult talking about it," he apologises, "which is not helpful for this conversation. But it's because it's not tangible. It's like anything that's emotional, it's a feeling. But it's like the weather, it affects the spirit of everything."

And so our conversation is littered with words such as "authentic" and "emotive" and "organic", as if he is grasping desperately for the language to express his great passion. He talks about the transformative musical moments of his 42 years – his first gig at the age of 15, watching Bob Dylan, of those late teenage years driving around his native Halifax with his best friend, listening to cassette tapes. Of the Cure, and the Damned, Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Tracy Chapman, Everything But the Girl, Alison Moyet, Julia Fordham and Joan Armatrading, to whom he listens "probably every week".

But it is when he begins to explain the tactile effect of music that he grows more articulate. "I've always loved a pure voice or a pure instrument," he says at one point. "One of my favourite Elton John tracks is Skyline Pigeon. You just hear his voice and that piano and it kind of makes you crack inside, it's so beautiful. I actually love it when you hear someone's voice break," he says. "It suddenly feels like there's nothing else there but you and a voice." He looks faintly nervous, as if he might have said something silly, but I think there is something rather fitting about a fashion designer who experiences music as texture and sensation.

When he tells me later about asking Odell to perform at the catwalk show he recalls how he gave the musician notably tactile instructions: "I said this is a fashion show, and you've got, you know, girls walking up and down, but I want people to feel the music – I want them to have that feeling where the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. Because that's how I feel when I listen to music."

British singer/songwriter Tom Odell: Bailey was impressed with his 'sincerity and authenticity'.

It is music, he says, that "definitely, often, usually" before anything else "sets the directional mood for what we're working on." Though this often seems to happen subconsciously. "You listen to a piece of music, and something sticks but you don't realise," he says. "And you start working on things and it tends to permeate everything you're then doing at that moment."

It is in fact now such a key part of the Burberry process that the company now has its own full-time music team — two people who "really are musos" with whom Bailey can have "the most random conversations that I would be embarrassed to have with anybody else. I can talk to them about a feeling or a particular kind of voice and they will just suggest an artist."

It is the music team that also steers Burberry's ongoing commitment to emerging musicians — not just with projects such as Burberry Acoustic but, as Bailey is keen to explain, in the way that the company "work on a lot of things that we don't show with musicians, matching artists up with the right management and record labels and things. It's a very authentic relationship, they know that we respect them."

It is in many ways an extension of the role Bailey has carved out for himself in the worlds of art and architecture, as well as fashion, nurturing young talent and burgeoning creativity from his work with the label's youth charity the Burberry Foundation, to his role as mentor at a number of institutions, from the Royal College of Art to the University of Huddersfield. "It's what I enjoy," he explains. "It's really selfish. But I'm in a really privileged position to do it. And my dream was always to build a design school that has all the different worlds that make you feel – from the design of clothes or a pair of sunglasses or shoes or bags, to furniture, architecture, web design, event design, physical space design, retail and offices, to packaging and video and photography, print, colour, textiles, music. Because they're all the senses. That's what I try to build up. Because I love working with people that feel and that care."

This is not perhaps a conventional route for a fashion design company, but it seems to be successful – last year, Burberry's total revenue was £2bn, with retail revenue up 12% and it now has a total of 533 stores worldwide, including the 44,000 sq ft flagship store in London. "Lots of people think that as a big public company your whole reason to be is about the business and about finance," Bailey says. "But actually I feel that if you have a spirit and a point of view, if you have people who are united and are joyously doing something that they love … well, then it's like the chicken and egg," he smiles. "It's nothing to do with money. It's just something that we love to do. It makes you real. And it's not cynical. We're not trying to flog things off the back of these things."

Back at Kensington Gardens last February, the day before the catwalk show, Bailey stood to watch Odell rehearse. "It was about four o'clock in the afternoon," he remembers. "There were technicians, lighting people, photographers preparing, cleaners cleaning … it was a chaotic thing. But then Tom started to play and the whole place just went completely silent and stood still. And I stood there, trying not to show that I was getting a bit emotional – but it was just one of those moments: Tom could've been at home alone in his bedroom, he just completely went into lockdown, into what he was doing. He completely made sense, and I was just blown away."

I wonder where Bailey, sitting atop this business empire, this design school, this great swirl of fashion and music and art, feels he makes most sense. He frowns. "I guess it's in those moments – whether you're fitting the collections or whether you're working on a building or whatever kind of thing you're doing, where everything becomes so unimportant because that feeling, that idea is so powerful," he says. "You might have tonnes of worries about other things and you're really crazed and you're busy and life is chaotic. But all of a sudden you don't care about anything else. That example of Tom playing in rehearsal was one of them. Nothing else mattered. And those moments you have to cherish'

Sonic Branding / Daniel Jackson. (for Research)

important abstracts that can explain sonic branding

source: google books

BURBERRY. RESEARCH ON MUSIC AND THE BRAND

HERE IS SOME INFORMATION FROM THE WEB-SITE, PROVING THE MUSIC HAS BEEN A HUGE PART OF THE STRATEGY OF THE BRAND

and Also an interview with the musician that was a part of Burberry for their branding strategies.


ENGAGING MUSICIANS IN THEIR CAMPAIGNS WAS ONE OF THE KEY STRATEGIES

I INTERVIEWED ONE OF THE 'FACES' FROM AW2011 CAMPAIGN, MY FRIEND

  MATTHEW WHITEHOUSE OF THE HEARTBREAKS FOR THIS RESEARCH

HOW DID YOU START COLLABORATION WITH BURBERRY?

 An intern who was over from New York happened to catch a Heartbreaks show at Proud Galleries in Camden one night and decided put my name forward for the campaign. Horseferry House got in touch, I went for a cup of tea with Christopher Bailey and the rest, as they say, is history.

HOW DOES IT FEEL TO BE A PART OF FASHION WHEN INITIALLY YOU START AS A MUSICIAN?

I think Burberry use musicians in a very positive way. Never once, as it easily could with a brand so large, does their use of music feel exploitative. On the contrary, it always feels collaborative and born from a genuine love of that very British link between fashion and music. 

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT BURBERRY'S STORES AND THE WAY THEY ARE PRESENTED?

Everything Burberry do, they do to the highest possible standard and by that I mean, when they put on a show, the sound is always good, the lighting is always good and the production is always good. I think, with a brands physical presence on the high street obviously becoming less and less important, encouraging consumers to view their spaces in different ways is vital.

WHAT IS SO IMPORTANT ABOUT THEIR RETAIL PRESENCE?

 As touched upon above, allow customers to use stores in a more immersive way is going to be very important in the future. Rolling out some of the features from their flag-ship Regent St store, for example, could be how they achieve this.

FML Burberry. Rebranded. New brand with a strong identity

The reason Burberry is discussed in my essay is because it is one of the strongest brands, that managed to change itself. One of the reasons was music and sound.
However, here are some official statistics to prove the brand can be a good example and a case study on how they approached sound to translate the brand is relevant.

^Disclaimer
This Annual Review does not constitute a summary financial statement for the purposes of sections 426-8 of the Companies Act 2006. A copy of the Burberry Group plc Annual Report and Accounts 2012/13 can be viewed free of charge, online at burberryplc.com.

This document contains certain statements that are forward-looking statements. They appear in a number of places throughout this document and include statements regarding our intentions, beliefs or current expectations and those of our officers, directors and employees concerning, amongst other things, our results of operations, financial condition, liquidity, prospects, growth, strategies and the business we operate. By their nature, these statements involve uncertainty since future events and circumstances can cause results and developments to differ materially from those anticipated. The forward-looking statements reflect knowledge and information available at the date of preparation of this document and unless otherwise required by applicable law the Company undertakes no obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements. Nothing in this document should be construed as a profit forecast. The Company and its directors accept no liability to third parties in respect of this document save as would arise under English law. This document does not constitute an invitation to underwrite, subscribe for or otherwise acquire or dispose of any Burberry Group plc shares, in the UK, or in the US, or under the US Securities Act 1933 or any other jurisdiction.



BURBERRY STRATEGY

Enhance consumer resonance and operate more effectively through exacting use of brand assets and coordinated action across the global organisation. One brand, one company.

Key highlights from 2012/13 include:

Brand momentum

Ensuring the strength, purity and positioning of the Burberry brand remained a priority.

Burberry World Live

• Burberry Regent Street opened in London in September 2012 as the brand’s most comprehensive expression to date. Introducing the concept of ‘Burberry World Live’, Regent Street blurred the physical and the digital to bring all aspects of burberry.com (‘Burberry World’) to life in a meticulously-restored heritage space.
• Offering the full collection in a digitally-enriched environment, Regent Street engaged customers with brand content continuously projected on over 100 screens throughout the store, including product-specific content triggered by RFID-enabled merchandise on mirrors that turn instantly to screens. In-store audiences could watch key brand moments live from other locations, including the womenswear S/S13 and A/W13 runway shows.
• Regent Street also gave physical expression to the brand’s most innovative digital launches. This included live music events featuring Burberry Acoustic artists and the first in-store Burberry Bespoke experience.

Beauty

• In October 2012, Burberry announced the transition of its fragrance and make-up business from a licensed to a directly operated structure.
• As consumers’ most widely encountered expression of the Burberry brand, Beauty provides outstanding growth opportunities for the Group. Business integration was completed during the year with operations commencing on 1 April 2013. 

Digital

• Investments in burberry.com continued with expanded delivery to over 100 countries, while the introduction of Spanish and Korean brought the number of languages online to eight.
• Retail theatre was rolled out to a further 84 stores, extending the global streaming of brand content in all flagship markets.

Brand recognition

• Listed in Interbrand’s ‘Top 100 Global Brands’ for the fourth consecutive year, Burberry was named the luxury fashion brand with the greatest increase in brand value. Burberry was cited by Altagamma as the luxury brand with the highest digital customer awareness and led media think tank L2’s ‘Fashion Digital IQ Index’ for the second year, as well as being named by L2 as the fashion brand with the highest ‘digital IQ’ in China. LinkedIn ranked Burberry the 29th most in-demand employer globally.

Marketing innovation

Continued extension of its reach through marketing innovation, leveraging brand content to engage and connect global audiences.

Digital engagement

• Brand excitement was driven globally across a range of platforms. The S/S13 main campaign generated record awareness through social and traditional media, with the launch video generating over 1.7 million views
  on YouTube and Burberry trending globally on Twitter. The womenswear A/W13 show was streamed live on Twitter for the first time, allowing followers to embed the show stream in personal newsfeeds.
• Burberry finished the year as the most followed luxury brand on Facebook, with nearly 15 million fans. Total lifetime YouTube video views reached nearly 24 million and the brand’s combined Twitter following was over two million. Burberry was also the leading luxury lifestyle brand on Instagram.

Outdoor investment

• Investment was increased in out-of-home marketing in key markets. To emphasise the brand’s association with weather, Burberry streamed live images of London scenes simultaneously throughout the Olympic period to prominent outdoor sites in London, Paris, Hong Kong, Los Angeles and New York.
• The Art Of The Trench social media platform was taken to outdoor spaces in London and Chicago in conjunction with flagship store launches.
• More broadly, the brand secured key airport and iconic urban locations on a long-term basis.

Product excellence

Burberry creates great product through intensive focus on design innovation, quality and core heritage icons.

Outerwear

• Outerwear is the core of the apparel business, underpinned by monthly fashion groups and a robust replenishment programme. Leveraging the brand’s unique heritage together with design innovation and excellence, outerwear accounted for about 50% of mainline apparel sales. The iconic trench coat continued to be a central feature of the brand’s marketing activities.

Mens

• Investments in infrastructure saw increased product and marketing excellence in men’s outerwear, London and Brit. As the fastest growing product division, mens represented 24% of retail/wholesale revenue.
• Retail sales of men’s tailoring, available in over 70 mainline stores, grew by nearly 70% year-on-year and the first dedicated standalone mens store opened in Knightsbridge, London.

Product hierarchy

• Burberry Prorsum and London continued to outperform, reflecting customer preferences and representing about half of womens and mens mainline retail sales. 
• An ongoing focus on innovative product, marketing and merchandising and a shift in the product pyramid mix drove growth in mainline average unit retail prices.
• Runway Made to Order launched, continuing to put the Burberry customer at the centre of increasingly personalised luxury experiences. Engraved nameplates could be added to outerwear and bags from the womenswear A/W13 collection. Smart personalisation technology was introduced to unlock bespoke digital content relating to each item on touchscreen devices.