Designers' Saturday 2007

Poof, what a long day! Today was Hong Kong's annual Designers' Saturday and it was quite exciting I must say especially since the company I work in, Fluid was a part of it so I got to feel all special welcoming guests in and talking to them about what I do. At around 1pm, I got to head out to all the other studios and I got to learn all about what they do as well as how their offices look. It ranges from the cozy, to the hip, to the really grand and high-class.

So far there are a few general things I learnt:

• If you got it, flaunt it. Almost everyone had stuff on display, showcasing their biggest clients. On top of that, almost everyone showcased their huge library of design resources and books, usually near the entrances.
  
• Be friendly. Everyone was really nice, willing to answer questions and give advice. The only thing I didn't like was when people were standing around being overly-friendly. What I mean is when people are standing to greet you at the lift to say "hi, welcome!" it made me felt like I was in a clothes store where all I wanted was to look around and this annoying salesperson kept bugging me.
• Normal neat and tidy. What I really liked was that many studios had their staff's desks in such a way I'd never suspect they purposely made it neat and tidy. I'm not doubting that they at least reduced the messiness, but compared to what my company did (we pretty much hid everything away other than our monitors, keyboard and mouse), they were a lot more honest.
• Inspiring view or area. Some places either had a little (and some big) outdoor area (I'm guessing for designers going through a mental block and smokers to escape) but usually featured some sort of lounging area. I don't know how free they are with allowing their staff to take it easy and lounge and read books, but whatever it is, at least they have a sofa :)
• Leaving you a memory. Fluid gave out coasters, Landor gave out pirated versions of the Designers' Saturday mascot (basically, they made their own dog and made it into a sticker sheet, not very classy if you ask me :\), Clifton Leung Designer Workshop gave out shitty Siemens mugs with their stickers on it and China Stylus (which is also Atomic Sushi) gave out posters and some really cool and hip stickers.

If you ask me, I was most excited when I visited China Stylus because they do urban art and boy did I have a good talk with them :) I got some contact information to get in touch with people interesting in exploring Hong Kong's urban art scene and hopefully I'll be able to help out and learn from all of them :) Now all I have to do is follow through. I'll probably post another entry when I follow through on that and get some sort of response so let's stay on track for now.

All in all, today was well worth it and I shall leave you with a set of pictures for you to enjoy along with captions explaining them :) Please feel free to share your comments about your experience as well. Forgive me for the noisy images (you designers should know what I mean, but basically I'm saying all the yucky graininess in the images) and some blurriness, I didn't want to use Flash or a tripod while inside the studios.

Designer's Saturday 2007