The Drum Awards for Marketing - Extended Deadline

-d -h -min -sec

Marque's Creative Collaboration

By The Drum, Administrator

July 3, 2009 | 3 min read

A Little Piece of Mind, “a confluence of Craft, Collaboration and Cause,” was a project created and curated by design studio Marque.

For the inaugural A Little Piece of Mind project, the agency briefed and commissioned Julie Floersch, one of the leading exponents of quilting, to create a contemporary quilt. In the spirit of collaboration, Marque asked renowned designers from the international creative communities to contribute ‘a little piece of mind’ – the swatch materials with which Floersch has executed her design.

Among those who contributed a single six inch square of fabric include: Kate Moss, Pringle, Rankin, Stella McCartney, Howie B, 404 Design, Airside, Troika, Paul Smith, Vivienne Westwood, Marc Jacobs, Richard Nicoll, Cath Kidston, Orla Kiely, Daisy & Poppy de Villeneuve, Boudicca, Kinder, Nell Bell Design, Urban Outfitters, Nicole Farhi, Damien Poulain, Swarovski, Jonathan Ellery, Squint, Gavin Turk, Alison Jackson, Jean Paul Gaultier, Silberfischer, Oliver Spencer, Begg, Squint, Rachel Speed and Slow and Steady Wins the Race, among others – 86 creatives were represented in the final quilt.

Many designers have given swatches of signature prints (Orla Kiely, Paul Smith), art or photography (Gavin Turk, Rankin) or designs from their latest collections (Alice Temperley, Luella). Each square is anonymous (contributors are listed in the limited-edition catalogue), so the patch is a guessing game as to who donated what.

From these contributions Floersch was able to create a large scale work.

An Exhibition and Auction of the quilt (which took place in London) raised £9,800 for Shelter in the UK and the Bowery Mission in New York. A catalogue documenting the process has also being produced and will be sold to further the charitable donations.

“For a few years now, we have been obsessively tracking the infiltration – often very positive – of modern techniques into craft forms,” said Mark Noe, MD of Marque.

“Quiltmaking is one area that has been at the forefront of this with young designers such as Julie Floersch exploring, pushing and redefining the language of the medium. While these designers are forward thinking, a traditional and historic aspect still remains through the use of natural materials and an insistence on age-old hand craft.

“As expressing craft and exploring collaboration are some of the core foundations of our design work, we enjoyed the challenge of pulling together seemingly disparate influences and inputs to make a coherent, influential output.

“Across three studio locations [Glasgow, London and New York] one of the constant objectives is to bring and develop a dedicated craft in design. Often this has meant commissioning specialised craft practitioners and artisans, or wherever possible, collaborating with those in the creative arts who share and express this type of approach.

“As an aesthetic philosophy, this project engaged us and it seems, our creative collaborators.”

The result was a Quilt that reinforces the fact that all it takes to make a big difference is a little personal time.

Trending

Industry insights

View all
Add your own content +