“Think global, act local”
A new advertising campaign is a complex project that requires us to reflect, discuss, both in and outside the company, and re-define our approach. Why do we need to take a fresh look at ourselves? What has changed over the last few years and what remains of a company’s visual identity, where the visual aspect is neither appearance nor outer form, but intimate essence? For the first time in its long history, Molteni&C has decided to look at itself from a “foreigner’s” point of view and to commission a young, international – or rather British team – to devise the identity of its campaign. This may be because novel ideas filter down from the North, like the Barbarians, with their fresh, vital energy, like the Nordic people in the golden age of international style. Maybe because today Molteni&C’s collections, entirely and rigorously Made in Italy, speak to the entire world in all languages. “Think global, act local”, as Yoko Ono would say. The result is a series of images that enhance the identity of a brand through its products but also through the atmosphere and settings chosen for the campaign: an early 20th century “club”. At Milan’s Circolo Filologico [Philological Society], visitors are still welcomed by the Chairman and the deputy chairman and the secretary with the pride of those that belong to a world that seems to have faded and yet mysteriously lingers on, in the streets of the city centre, between La Scala and Mediobanca. And the philologists, who study ancient languages like Sanskrit, express no surprise at being invaded by the “barbarians” of design: sofas, kitchens, bookcases, props, bizarre blond-haired Englishmen, a Japanese woman with her dog and teams of uniformed assemblers, smart and discreet like the volumes stacked in the Thirties bookcase. An invasion orchestrated with Apollonian grace by art director, Kuchar Swara, exquisitely arranged by interior stylist Faye Toogood, with her vocation for space and detail, and framed in the snapshots of Norwegian photographer Marius W. Hansen. And there, in the middle, the proud and gentle musicians, the Molteni&C furnishings and Dada’s Trim kitchen, crafted by the skilful hands of the “barbarians”, the leading players in new stories that will leave the Milanese Philological Society to travel who knows where, with the energy of a project that has become an image. This is how Molteni&C is inaugurating its new 2012 advertising campaign, with “portraits” of the 505 system, of the Portfolio sofa and armchair, of Dada’s Trim kitchen, set amongst props and off-scale sculptures in the Liberty room and in the library of Milan’s oldest cultural association, the Circolo Filologico, which has been promoting the culture and study of languages and civilizations since 1872.
