q uq part 2

Aboud Sodano Alan Aboud — Design Practice Interview by Eamon Spilman For the last 25 years, Alan Aboud has worked extensively with innovative fashion, beauty, fragrance and lifestyle brands, including Paul Smith, Zara, Levi’s, H&M, River Island and Ne- al’s Yard Remedies. Last month, Eamon Spelman talked to him about his work for Paul Smith and, during that interview, he spoke about, amongst other things, his working practice. In the follow- ing piece, he gives an honest account of his work and how, after many years in the business, he is not resting on past achievements but instead searching out new challenges and opportunities. 1

Aboud Sodano At college, there were no business elements in- tegrated into the course curriculum so when we started out, we had no business plan, but we were lucky and things kept rolling. For 26 years, work just came to us, which is probably not a good idea - it’s only in the last two years that we have actively being going out to get new business. With the ben- efit of hindsight, it is never a good idea to throw all your eggs into one basket and now we are trying to pull back and be a bit more ‘democratic’, both with the amount and kinds of clients that we work with. I don’t have any regrets about setting up a business but I have got a few thoughts about how I could have done things a bit better, in terms of strategy, for myself. You spend your life failing in this business and thinking, ‘why did I do it for nothing?’ I once went to a talk with Neville Brody and one ‘work for someone of the things he said was, ‘work for someone else, make else, make mistakes and let them pay for it.’ mistakes and let There is a certain rationale to that but, today, peo- them pay ple don’t think twice about starting out on their own. They have a predisposition to not be both- for it.’ ered about going through the tough times that are often part of having your own business. We have never been pigeon-holed, except possibly in fashion, with Paul [Smith], but now we do a lot of work with advertising agencies, who bring us in to collaborate on projects. We work directly with clients in all sorts of different ways, which fluctu- ate from graphic design to art direction, and we have a two-year book project that we are currently working on with an American company. At the same time, we are still doing fashion projects. So it’s a mixture between being graphic designers, creative directors and art directors. 2

Aboud Sodano The more successful you are, the less time you have to design. The more successful you are, the less time you have But it’s a constant fear that the ideas to design. Work becomes all about getting new business will run out. It’s such a youth-oriented business nowadays. Then I look back and making presentations. That’s what happens unless you at what I would perceive as the great make a specific decision to remain a designer, first and fore- designers, the likes of Saul Bass, who most. There is a friend of mine, the designer Jonathan Barn- were working into their 80s. But yes, brook, who is very principled in what he does and how he you do have a fear that you won’t get does it; I’m not saying I’m not [principled] but he has a very another project. political outlook on things. He has the same studio set up Twenty years ago, the goal was to get for 25 years and a couple or assistants working for him. He’s your work into design publications designing every day, whereas I’m not. like Creative Review, Eye, Design Week People ask what I do and I say, apart from idea generation, or Graphics International (which later team construction: pulling together the talent and then being became Grafik) and, when you could the catalyst for that talent to solve the problem collective- afford it, try to enter the D&AD in ly for a client. With any project we take on, I have to think order to raise your profile. Now, with about added value in terms of what we can do that’s different social media, you can create your own to what other people would do. My goal is to try and find news-worthiness and push it out there. clients that will give us the problem and allow us to solve the It’s more democratic in terms of putting problem. I had a meeting with someone this morning and your creative work out there - you don’t they asked ‘what can you bring to the table’ and I said ‘what have to have a degree anymore, you we can bring to the table is ideas’. It sounds simplistic but don’t even have to have a camera. It’s a that’s all we are about. I think as long as you can still keep different playing field. coming up with ideas, you should be able to get a job. 3

Aboud Sodano I think people are realising they have to do It goes back to people like the general man- something different because anyone thinks ager of Team Sky, Dave Brailsford, and they can do a fashion shoot. The buzz word what he calls incremental gains. He says the at the moment is ‘earned media’ and clients principle came from the idea that, if you are saying ‘we want our customers and our broke down everything you could think of supporters to publicise us through social me- that goes into riding a bike and then im- dia’. What a lot of people are missing is the proved each of those things by 1%, you’d get fact that, unless they give their support and a significant increase when you put them all their customers the content to arm them- together. selves, then it’s not going to work. A lot of It’s not all about just saying ‘we are going to people think ‘let’s just post this picture of our do better’; it’s about looking at making this new pair of shoes that are out and I’m sure little part of the whole process a tiny bit bet- all our followers will like it.’ There has to be ter and then another bit. something original. It’s that kind of thing in the design industry - I think it is really important to have an I think it’s quite exciting. We’ve got so much understanding of data. We do some work information and we need to understand how for Manchester United and, recently, I was that can influence our ideas. The course of in Hong Kong at their partner’s conference. design is impetuous and our influences are It’s a three-day event, where sponsors come everywhere, from going to the cinema to over, there are talks and a cross-pollination going to a football match or whatever. But, of ideas and support. One of these talks was in this day and age, you need some kind of from the director of football development mathematical nuance to put all those things about how they are collecting digital in- into context. formation to understand the performance of players. They are accumulating tons of information and are talking to people like Chevrolet, who are experts in the field, and are advising them as to how to get the best from this data. designed and edited by 4 Vasil Stoyanov