unbelievable. achievable.
Working with a local charity to make a national impact, and a world of difference to the lives of blind and partially sighted children and adults.
Whatever their size, all our clients come to us with big expectations. In particular, smaller clients who can’t rely on existing brand recognition and a mammoth media spend to get them noticed. We’ve proven that a simple, powerful and compelling creative idea can provide this attention. It can turn heads, get comments, get recognition and deliver results. We believe that the power of an idea should never been underestimated.
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The Brief
Steiff, the world renowned manufacturer of luxury teddy bears, kindly donated 20 limited edition white label 'Jessica' bears to Living Paintings to sell at auction. The aim was to raise enough funds to enable Living Paintings to produce two new touch and sound packs; introducing famous bears such as Sooty and Pudsey and also the mind-boggling world of fashion, to blind and partially sighted teenagers and adults. Living Paintings enlisted the help of 20 celebrities to add their personal touch to each bear.
This was the the most prestigious event ever held by Living Paintings. Our role was to create a personality and brand for the event, to be held at the V&A, and to design and produce a suite of event material including: save the dates, invitations, auction catalogues, bidding paddles, banners, an onscreen presentation and goodie bags.
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Our approach
The bears were the stars of the show. They were not children’s toys designed to be played with, they were high profile, incredibly valuable teddies. They were styled, dressed and endorsed by stars of the fashion world such as Dame Vivienne Westwood, Lulu Guinness, Betty Jackson, Stella McCartney, Matthew Williamson and icons such as Sir Peter Blake, Richard Branson, and Julian and Emma Kitchener-Fellowes. Our brand had to be flexible enough to work with each unique bear and unite them as the exclusive Steiff collection. Their common theme… they were all Teds at heart.
It’s often the simplest of ideas that are the most successful, and the most fun to play with. Our guests would all be inviTED to the auction, they would be delighTED by the unique lots and our bears were destined to be adopTED!
And so the Living Paintings auction of highly collectible Steiff bears was named WanTED.
The great thing about working with concepts is that when you have found the Eureka moment, the concept flows like a dream, TED had legs and we just had to keep up! WanTED was in the diary, the save the dates were in the post and invitations were being designed at haste as the TEDs began to flood in from their celebrity stylists. Each TED arrived with its own quirk: be it a tiara and feather bower courtesy of Joan Collins, miniature jodhpurs and Godolphin silks from Frankie Dettori and even a pint-sized racing yacht from Dame Ellen MacArthur. Although they had all begun life as the same ‘Jessica’ bear, they were now celebrities in their own right and they demanded to be treated like A-listers.
With so many variables we soon realised that an illustrative approach would allow us to incorporate all of the different elements – from photographs of the celebrity stylists arriving in all shapes and sizes, their signatures, logos, the bears and their entourage of accessories to complying with Living Paintings brand guidelines. This flexible style ticked so many of the boxes, and allowed us to throw reality out of the window.
Working closely with Patrick Morgan, an incredibly talented illustrator who is entrenched in the British fashion industry, we created the look and feel. This included the hand-drawn logo, wallpaper visuals, gilt picture frames and additional elements which came together to create the perfect visual identity.
The ‘save the dates’ came with TED fridge magnets; the invitation booklets showed the bears getting ready for the event and the catalogue featured an 8 page throw out spread showing the full line up of TEDs.
The publicity ball was rolling and gaining speed. We had the call that Peter Jones had donated their shop windows, just off the Kings Road and the space was ours to publicise the WanTED event. The space wasn’t huge, but the footfall was amazing. We produced the backboards and the vinyl artwork and went up with the Living Paintings team to set the stage. It was a dream come true from a design perspective. Nine bears occupied three windows and they were in their element and loved every minute of the attention they received – which was a constant stream of smiles, oohs and ahhhs!
At the V&A the route from the reception to the auction room was marked out in paw print floor stickers and the bidding paddles incorporated a thermo (a raised version) of the original ‘Jessica’ bear. The banner stands looked striking with their orange wallpaper backdrops and told the story of the two touch and sound packs Living Paintings are looking to produce. And the pots of honey in the goodie bags were right on brand!
Results
The auction attracted attention from bidders worldwide. The room was filled with over 200 eager bidders with champagne in hand. The telephone bidding lines were red hot. The lights went down and our presentation kicked off the auction with an introduction from Prunella Scales, Betty Jackson and Dame Jacqueline Wilson. The bears were sold one by one with the highest (he has asked us to retain his anonymity) raised just short of £4,000. The evening raised over £35,000 in total and was a fantastic success raising both funds and the profile of the Living Paintings charity and its’ work with the blind and partially sighted.
And the client said...
This work is way beyond fantastic – I genuinely feel a touch teary at the quality of the work you are pulling out of your studio for us, I feel so proud of all of us for coming together on this – I know I knew this already, but I have to say you are just the most amazing people.
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