I have a garden, and I actually enjoy mucking in and getting things done. I’ve also learnt from experience that thinking ahead is essential. If you want to laze in a summer garden (let me tell you about my hammock one day), you better make sure you have things planted and trimmed in time – and that means months in advance.
So it was nice working on a series of brochures for Fiskars for the RRCO agency in Antwerp. The idea is quite simply to give people a few seasonal tips and pointers, as well as highlighting the products that they sell. Fiskars make high quality garden equipment such as cutters and weed pullers.
When I look at the amount of text editing, trimming and pruning that goes into the average campaign, I think there probably is a case to be made for the copywriter as a gardener. It’s also nice to see strategy being developed over a period of time, and being able to sit under the conceptual tree that you might have planted years before. Here’s a thought from Fiskars website:
If a person cannot love a plant after he has pruned it, then he has either done a poor job or is devoid of emotion.
-Â Liberty Hyde Bailey
What we should be aiming at, of course, is the same thing in copywriting.
I must admit that I’ve been a reasonably slow adopter over the years. Our telly tends to be old, we have no air conditioning and the rollers are wound up and down by hand. So I was interested to hear about IO-Homecontrol through the Polygone agency. Their client IO-Homecontrol markets systems that enable a number of home appliances, such as blinds, alarm systems, heating and doors or gates, to work together. Polygone produced brochures, ads and a website for them to which we contributed. You’ll find more at 
I’ve worked for a number of hotels over the years, including an interesting spell doing lots of behind-the-scenes writing for the Sheraton group. So it was nice to get called by the former Royal Crown Hotel in Brussels for the development of Hotel Bloom! The hotel has been totally revamped top to bottom, with the owners creating a very specific tone. We worked on a whole range of communications for them, right down to the flavour text on the toiletries (never been asked for that before). One of the funkier ideas they had was to let a number of artists create frescoes in the rooms with the theme of “blooming”. The baseline of the hotel sums up the experience pretty well: “Stay away from the ordinary”. Check the 
I’d heard that companies were beginning to advertise on the online game Second Life but had yet to know anyone that tried. As MIPCOM, the trade fair devoted to audiovisual content, has been trumpeting the virtues of cross-media platforms, it only seems normal that they should give it a spin. Through the agency Consorcom, we provide texts for MIPCOM’s brochure and ads. So I was curious to see what sort of visibility Second Life offers. The bad news is that I couldn’t really get through. I think my aging computer has something to do with this. But moving about Second Life is really sluggish on a Saturday night. I’ll try again at another time and keep you posted.
Here’s one I particularly enjoyed writing. Crown Paints Ireland were looking to seriously revamp their brochure. The approach taken by TBWA/Brussels was to show the human side of painting – how enjoyable it can be and the incredible difference a good coat of paint can make. As I worked as a painter for a year a long time ago, it was a way of going back to my roots, in a way (or at least re-visiting something I enjoyed doing). The Crown Paints brochure also gave me an opportunity to continue an old battle of mine: War on White. Is there a more bland and weak-willed choice of colour than white? The art direction, photography and production on this one are top-class. Congrats to TBWA/Brussels and Crown Paints. Click through for one of the inside pages.