What happens when you take a visual designer and a big supply of tea and biscuits and throw them into a room with a copywriter (or a ‘brand language consultant’ if you prefer)?
Carl Jeffrey from Fellow (a ‘creative midwife’ who delivers creative ideas) and I have recently spent a good chunk of time on two emerging brands; my project being The Copy House and Carl’s being The Sustainable Widget. As we were working together, this quote from Nabokov sprung to mind as the perfect way to show the massive importance of this kind of collaboration (and for that matter any collaboration in new media):
“Does there not exist a high ridge where the mountainside of ’scientific’ knowledge joins the opposite slope of ‘artistic’ imagination?” Nabokov, Audubon’s Butterflies, Moths and Other. Review for New York Times December 28, 1952.
In this case the collaboration is the bridge between the designer’s imagination and language that’s needed to brief the designer. Its where design and language meet to collaborate on a brand.
So that might also help you formulate an idea of the ‘lesser-spotted brand language consultant’. My latest venture with VGroup was also a highly interesting and visual journey that they’ve kindly documented in their latest newsletter (I came into the picture after the completion of the visual branding, slogan/strapline development and product design phases).
If you’d like to know more about brand language development, you know where I am. Thanks for all your help Carl!
