It will be obvious to anyone who has visited our site from time to time, or who follows the new column, that rather a lot has changed in our lives this last year. This Christmas period really brought it home to me. Apart from being a designer, producer and distributor I (we) have also become an entrepreneur in the hospitality industry and a retailer. And with Christmas comes decorating.
A year later, all those around me appear to have more time free, since I’m the one they put on the hot seat to come up with ideas for Christmas. I racked my brains feverishly on the subject of Christmas decorations, preferably something still reflecting the corporate identity; little chocolate robots and Christmas trees: not enough time for that, a small Jesus robot on the cross: but the crucifixion is for Easter not Christmas (one wonders whether anyone would actually stop and think about it, but still), or a winged robot as angel: but that ended up looking more like a devil. Just when I was satisfied, Jeanine told me that Jesus was far too thin and the angel’s wings were all wrong. Moreover, such a robot Jesus or angel could well cause all sorts of negative reactions.
A whole lot of Christmas trees on the ceiling then? Already been done, according to Muk. And indeed, when we visited Merci in Paris recently, it turned out that it had already been done with the trees hung upside down from the ceiling. Walking into a place like that makes you lose heart because there are stars, trees and gifts absolutely everywhere. There are even items especially for Christmas. That means serious investing. I have never found it easy to pour a lot of money and energy into something which consequently gets thrown away, even when it is intended to celebrate the birth of Jesus himself.
Before we visited Paris, we were in Reims, in connection with a commission for the oldest existing brand of champagne and we also visited the cathedral there. They had black nailing gussets where you could light a candle: very church-like, and typically Christmas too. On the way home, Jeanine and I came up with the idea of making posters with Christmas trees, looking like old school geography maps.
Together with Edwin of Studio Boot, we got straight to work on a Christmas tree poster. You can just roll it up and use it again next year. We actually had quite a serious poster in mind, but Edwin can’t do without humour, so the poster turned out to be good fun too. We covered a work bench with nailing gusset and candles, and sprayed it black, and instead of the robot being Jesus or an angel, we transformed it into Father Christmas.
And we still have Guido Geelen’s Christmas tree as trump card up our sleeves if needs be. We can put it up every year again. After I’d got everything in place, it looked a bit tacky and tasteless, but luckily, the ladies knew what to do with all the stuff. It looks good now, I think. And for next year, we now have an assortment of Christmas decorations already, and also a lot of ideas for which there was too little time this year.
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