Why waste your money on design?!

If you've got a minute (and you're interested in this kind of thing) watch this. It is so funny that we can even forgive the people who created it.

Home Sweet Home

All back in London after our working holiday and the office is now up and running again, with hopefully a seamless transition. If you did experience any difficulties in communicating with us, please let us know, so we can make sure that it doesn't happen again.

Moving forward, we've a couple of exciting projects in the pipeline, including a new website for the Finchley Charities, a 500 year old charity that supplies housing, the continuation of work for the London Clinic and projects for Trinity PR and the imminent completion of the Sensible Studios website.

Following that, next month we have projects including an annual report for a new client in the Shetland Islands, who we met via the Deal Generator. Progress will also be made on the website for a property development company we're involved with.

Of course with the continuing gloomy news on the economic front, you may think that now might be the time to tighten the belt on the design and communications front. But studies show that actually companies that spend through a slowdown or downturn tend to be stronger when the economic cycle picks up. Basic rule of thumb being; you should never let your customers forget you are there. We of course are here to advise on how to do this with cost effective solutions to keep you in your customers mind.

If you have any projects coming up that you'd think we might be able to help you with, please contact us at HUGHES | DESIGN on info@hughes-design.co.uk

Scuba Datça

Mahmut Suner, underwater adventurer, cinematographer, former dive centre owner, and neighbour to us here in Datça, asked us to look at the jacket for his new book on the dive sites of the seas around the peninsular.

Mahmut has published 4 books over the years, his most recent being The Dive Sites of Bodrum where he lived up until recently.

The new book, like his others is to be published in English and Turkish, so we needed a solution that was bi-lingual – so we tried a few options. The strongest solution was simply Scuba Datça.

The word Datça also presented us with the opportunity to be playful with the cedilla – which we experimented with, intiall trying it as a fish, a diver in scuba gear, eventually settling on making it an air supply and mask.
We then combined this typography with some stunning under water photography, the results of with are published below.

Mahmut was very pleased with the results.

So, much so, we think we can confidently describe Mahmut Suner as an underwater adventurer, cinematographer, former dive centre owner, neighbour to us here in Datça... and a happy client too.

The perfect work/life balance

School summer holidays can be expensive for working parents, childcare suddenly rockets and a certain amount of guilt can set in.  As an experiment this year we have relocated our business to Villa Diva in Datca, Turkey, where there is broadband in the house and wireless by both pools.  A Blackberry means that we can see what is coming in, when it comes in and for peace and quiet one of us can work from the house while the other stays by the pool keeping an eye on the children.

Thinking Linked-in...

Back in the mid nineties, both Julia and I worked at BCA – Book Club Associates – recognised then as one the leading players in the DM business. We produced full page adverts and inserts in the press selling book club membership around the simple proposition of 4 books for 99p. Admittedly, the work wasn't the most exciting, but the people and the atmosphere at the office more than made up for this. The other great thing about BCA was that it was full of marketers, copywriters and art directors/designers and we all socialised together regularly.

Over the years as that group has moved on, many of us have remained in touch. This loose affiliation have helped each other out with freelance work and recommendations, staying in contact, first through email and more recently with the likes of Facebook, Myspace and Linked-in.

Recently we (HUGHES | DESIGN) needed a Heavyweight copywriter on a project and we were trying work out if knew anyone from the old days. At roughly the same time an old colleague from back then, whom I was in touch with already on Facebook, asked for a recommendation on Linked-in. Now this probably says more about me, but it never crossed my mind to think of this ex-colleague as a professional when I'd be in contact with them on Facebook. It took an e-mail from Linked-in to make the professional connection and prod me into action. Suffice to say they did they did the copywriting job too.

So is it just me who when on Facebook sees it purely as social tool? Or should I increasingly be thinking that Facebook presents business opportunity to network? Should I be using Linked-in to be sociable? I've heard tell of a man who if you buy him lunch, will give you access to his thousands of friends on Facebook and in return you can market your product or service to his contact book. Is this really the future of marketing or just one man's plan to eat well? If it's anything, it's certainly food for thought.

What's with the blog?

Mike and I have been watching our website creep up Alexa's traffic ranking table, we are currently 919,917 - and, between you and me, I am pretty pleased about this. The blog is a little experiment in search engine optimisation: everyone knows that content is king, so let's see if a blog makes a difference.

www.east-finchley.com: one year on

Our involvement with this project came after we responded to an article in our local newspaper, The Archer, where Paul of the Phoenix Cinema and Jana of the Noble Sage Art Gallery were suggesting that local businesses should get together to put East Finchley on the map - in its rightful place alongside better known neighbours such as Muswell Hill, Highgate and Hampstead. Meetings were called,traders were interested, and REEF (the Regeneration and Enhancement of East Finchley) was born.

The first projects included a website, and this went live one year ago. In addition to providing local news from the Phoenix Cinema, The Archer and general sources, the website is becoming an online directory for local businesses with its free listing facility. Paid advertising slots have also proved popular, so popular in fact that we have had to build in capacity!