To mark our 10 year anniversary we thought it would be good fun to ask the Arch directors what their top ten moments have been. In no particular order here’s Joe’s list.
1) I am officially Mr Thornton. Yes, that’s my face adorning those Thornton’s toffee bags. To prove how hands-on we get, Luke photographed me in a plethora of precarious positions, balancing on old bikes and contraptions in a Heath Robinson fashion. Our illustrator Steve then replicated the poses which now grace the ‘nostalgia’ range of Thornton’s confectionary. To top it off Brad Pitt bought a box of Toffees for Angelina Jolie’s main wedding present (apparently she got a taste for them whilst filming in England). Does this mean those Hollywood A listers have seen my face? Mmmm.
2) Off the back of designing a range of branding and film poster campaigns I was invited to be an extra in gangster movie ‘St George’s Day’. I shared a scene with the controversial world heavyweight champion Tyson Fury and Top Gear’s original Stig, Perry McCarthy. Blink, and you’ll miss me. I was subsequently invited to the red carpet premiere and the Cannes film festival. Sometimes the job does have its perks.
3) Pitching to gregarious Italian chef Gino D’a campo and his business partners in a sweltering basement office in Fleet Street, winning the account and then being invited backstage to Gino’s live cooking show at the ITV studios by The Thames. This was good. Being singled out by the warm-up guy who coerced me to dance to ‘Careless Whisper’ in front of a 500 strong crowd. This wasn’t so great.
4) Lecturing at Leicester University on the eve of the reinturment of Richard III. There was a buzz around the campus, and Leicester was back on the map. Along with genetic fingerprinting, the University had discovered the last Plantagenet – underneath a car park. Darren and I discovered nerves, but it was an honour to be invited to lecture to a roomful of business undergraduates, culminating in a surprising round of applause.
5) I’m an avid football fan, so for me working with Leicester City Football Club has lots of benefits. I’m giving away my age by saying that I saw Gary Lineker play in my first ever match at Filbert Street and I’ve remained a consistent spectator throughout the lows and highs ever since. We don’t work as much with the club these days, but we still keep our hand in. I’ve had a season ticket for the past few years and Arch’s ten year anniversary year has coincided with an exceptional season for the club…beyond my wildest dreams. A couple of years ago we created a meme of Richard III wearing an LCFC kit, entitled ‘King Power’ – it went viral on Facebook with thousands of likes and shares. And a few weeks ago we created a pump clip for Steamin’ Billy’s new light ale ‘Vardy’s Volley’, named after LCFC’s top goal scorer – our designs were showcased on ITV news, Sky TV and the national press.
6) One of our first clients was the electronics company Sanyo and they set us a brief to design an animated advert for their rechargeable batteries ‘Eneloop’ which would be displayed at Christmas time at “the world’s most iconic advertising landmark”, Piccadilly Circus. Our concept, featuring the strap line “Batteries for life, not just for Christmas” was a hit, but it was more of a thrill to see our designs lit up in all their glory in London’s busiest shopping period at this most globally famous environment.
7) We set our creatives a task to design a Christmas campaign to celebrate our anniversary year and one of our designers had the bright idea of The Arch ‘band’ performing a Christmas pop video parody. I re-wrote the lyrics to Slade’s Merry Christmas everybody’ and developed a storyboard based around the Arch team giving their bosses some questionable gifts. The ‘Arch Rivals’ recorded the song and then we all had great fun being filmed playing their parts in this tragic little story. The resulting video went down a storm with our clients and suppliers alike.
8) I’m a big Beatles fan and Abbey Road is my favourite of their albums, so this one was a tad self indulgent. Working on a new campaign for Pretty Polly called London Legs, we photographed some colt like models parading the iconic zebra crossing emblazoned in Sergeant Pepper get up. Two albums for the price of one. We were aware it was a design cliché but we also knew the American target market would lap it up. For a couple of minutes we stopped the London buses and black cabs in their tracks…along with a couple of dozen Japanese tourists.
9) We’ve achieved a fair few design accolades (including the RAR awards winning trophy we received last night!), but taking the top crown at the Leicester Mercury business of the year awards in 2014 was sweet because we weren’t expecting to win. The after party wasn’t memorable for all the right reasons.
