For us in California, we’ve been putting in base mileage with our cycling mates, and shedding those extra pounds that were put on during the holidays. It also means that the historic cobblestones, pavé, of northern France will be inviting those legendary riders to test their acrobatic skills - come rain or shine.

Arguably, the Paris Roubaix seems to be the most notable in the Spring Classics. As for myself, I favor the Tour of Flanders. It too has the romance, if you can call it that, of the roughly cobbled raceway - with the added torture of steep hill climbs. Really steep. Add the historical elements of place, rider, traditions and the screaming fans. It’s a great way to get the season underway.

This year as a special project in the studio, we are putting together a series of cycling posters that celebrate some of the famous races and climbs of European cycling. We’ve limited the number of posters that will be available - and they will be signed and numbered. This first release is the Ronde van Vlaanderen, Tour of Flander, Le Ronde - which is held in Belgium every spring.

LeRonde on the press

The race began in 1913 - and this year will be its 96th edition through the cobbled hills of Belgium. Of the 17 climbs this year will be several that we’ve grown to love: Molenberg at 17%, Taaienberg at 18% and my favorite, Koppenberg at 22-25% grade.

We have a local climb here in Laguna Beach, Nyes Place at 20%. It’s a challenge for many. But to have a 22%+ grade WITH cobbles, at race pace…yes, that’s a whole new level. Cheers to the legends!

To purchase one of these limited edition prints - please click here.

18" x 24" silk screened print

London 2012 water polo venue

During Monday’s presentation we learned about several of the “temporary” building structures being built on the Olympic site. The idea behind this thinking is to keep construction costs down and be able to recycling the structures once the Games have ended. Otherwise London would be stuck paying for the building maintenance of structures that would likely not get much use.

The water polo venue, pictured above, is one of those buildings. It has been designed with pre-existing building materials (i.e. not custom made), that are able to be easily constructed for the Games, and easily recycled after the Games. In fact, some of the materials are being returned to the supplier - as if they had rented it.

Water polo venue under construction with pre-fab materials

6.5-million people are expected to travel to London to watch the 2012 Games. There are no parking spaces at the Olympic Park - and the IOC has asked that everyone arrive by public transportation. 70% of the attendees are expected to arrive by rail, the others by walking, cycling or ‘other’ modes of transportation.

Our project this week was to create a campaign for Buro Happold that would encourage people to ride their bikes to the Olympic Park. The distance from Central London to the Olympic Park is roughly 11km - roughly a 40-minute ride. The challenge would be to convince the public that it was easy.

The design process of concepting ideas

The students had to research data that compared travel times for rail, car and cycling. As well as data about Londoners and their behaviors as it related to cycling - or excuses not to cycle.

Setting the stage for Buro Happold to see the design solutions

Working very hard throughout the week, the students had come up with their campaigns and the data to support their conclusions. After their presentations, several of the Buro Happold principals critiqued the work shown - which I feel is always a key part of this course. This led to some good back and forth discussions on the habits of Londoners when it comes to cycling.

A campaign example in the Underground stations

Additional information about the sustainability and Buro Happold’s participation can be seen in blog posts from the past two trips (listed on the right).

We were fortunate enough to be here in London during yesterday’s official “1-Year To Go” ceremony in Trafalgar Square. Thousands of people showed up to watch the first official dive into London’s new Olympic Aquatics Centre, as well as to see the the unveiling of the 2012 Olympic Medals that will be given out during the the Games.

There were special presentations giving by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, and Sebastian Coe, who will be in charge of seeing the Games through.

I was glad our students had the opportunity to be witness to this event, as I’m sure it will elevate their viewing experience when the Games begin next summer.

Concept for Olympic Village after the 2012 London Games

London has set a new bar for all future Olympic Games based on this type of planning, and already has set in place the Olympic Park Legacy Company that will insure the citizens of London this property will continue to develop in a healthy economic manner.

EDAW is one of the key players in the winning consortium that helped London to win the bid. Our project this past week with the Chapman University students was to design business collateral that would appeal to potential developers who will want to come in and build out the spaces on the new Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park once the 2012 Games have concluded. In the UK these are referred to as ‘development prospectus.’

Chapman University students at EDAW/AECOM

In the past two years, we have had the students working on projects that focused on outdoor monuments that celebrated the athletes of the 2012 Games. We purposely changed this year’s assignment to have the students learn more about the big picture idea of ‘legacy.’ Adam Williams, title, informed the students of the planning efforts and thinking that went into the final design solutions for the Legacy Plan. The students had time for some Q&A - and spent the balance of the week working in teams to concept and design their materials.

No nervous jitters...ready to go!

On Friday the Chapman students presented their design solutions to EDAW, having pulled together statistical data that would be a key element that developers would be looking for - and presenting it in a very clear manner. EDAW was again impressed with the students work and gave good critical feedback.

A sample of cover designs for the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park prospectus'

The challenge with projects such as these, is finding good architectural imagery that conveys the ‘idea’ of developing the Olympic Park - it needs to be somewhat vague so that the imagination of the developer can picture their own projects in place. Our students performed brilliantly.

This week we’re working with Buro Happold, the engineers who are working toward keeping these the greenest Games ever. Stay tuned.

Chapman University students at Stratford Station - Olympic stadium pictured in background

The Olympic Park has a very aggressive plan for completion. The property is to be turned over to the IOC by end of November. The IOC will then conduct ‘test events’ to be sure that the Park runs smoothly during the Games. From what we could see on our tour, the Cycling Velodrome and Basketball stadiums are nearly complete, with a test event for cycling slated for 31 July.

These will be the first Games that have been designed around the principle of Legacy; meaning that the site has been planned for development of a city regeneration at a scale not done in Europe for over 150 years. The athlete housing will convert to residential units for sale/rent when the Games are complete. The onsite IOC center is slated to be an academy for primary and middle school and there have been major improvements to bring the EuroStar station to the park for ease of Europe accessing the new city. Paris will only be 2-hours away.

Presenting our projects to LOCOG

The students had worked very hard on their projects throughout the week - and were ready to present their designs to Yasmine Raffoul, Brand Manager for LOCOG, as well as Vance Ng, who is in charge of the 2012 Mascots. Vance was brought in based on his work for the Vancouver Games’ mascots.

Team 1 presenting Fit+Fun campaign

Both teams presented their materials exceptionally well, having done their background research on the goals and objectives of the 2012 Games, and learning about how the Mascots would play a big role in getting UKs youth to participate in sport. To learn more about the Mascots click here.

Team 2s concept - Gear Up

The campaigns focused on themes that would attract the attention of both kids and parents - and get them to attend an Open Weekend event. These weekends would be held at the Olympic Park and have athletes from Team Britain instruct or demonstrate their sport of expertise. Most of the placements we targeted for large posters in the Underground or on city buses.

Yasmine and Vance giving professional critiques of the students presentations

When the students were finished with their presentations, they received professional critiques from Yasmine and Vance. This program has been designed with that objective so the students could learn to interface with their professional colleagues during campaign pitches. Yasmine and Vance were both extremely impressed with both the design work presented and the verbal presentations from the students. There was a comment made that the agencies that they’ve been interfacing with might have to step up their game, as here were two groups of University students who put together two presentations in a very short period of time AND their work was a bit edgier than what they have been receiving.

Fantastic!

Chapman University students @ LOCOG

We’re in London for the third time, studying the Branding of the 2012 London Olympics. The Chapman University students have their first assignment for the week - working with London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (LOCOG), they’ll be coming up with a campaign to encourage the children of the UK to attend an Open Weekend where they can test out sports that are slated for the London Games.

Yasmine Raffoul presents the key brand points to the students

The students get an overview about brand objectives and guidelines for the upcoming games. It’s their ‘behind the velvet rope tour’ that has only been given to Chapman University. At this point, students already have the creative briefs and are there to ask smarter questions about their assignment. Of course, like myself, they’d like to get a sneak peak into what lies ahead for LOCOGs upcoming efforts with the branding of the Games. But due to very strict guidelines - both you and I will have to wait for the next unveiling.

In the meantime, the students are deep into their concepting phase of the project. This is where they come up with many different ideas on how they could solve the communication problem at hand. The students are divided up in to two work groups and will continue to develop their concepts throughout the week. Ultimately presenting their final designs to LOCOG on Friday.

Concepting begins with words and big picture ideas

The second round develops visual support for the messaging

The students present their ideas throughout the process - just as they would working in a design studio

Dana Point Police Services Community Service Unit

In February of 2009, Real Life Brand Architecture assisted Dana Point’s Police Unit in launching an awareness campaign to help prevent crimes in their city. Hide it. Lock it. Or Lose it. (visit the site)

This week The International Association of Chiefs of Police honored the Dana Point Police Services Unit with the coveted IACP/Motorola Webber Seavey Award for Quality in Law Enforcement. We, of course, were very pleased to hear this news.

“The campaign website continues to generate interest with hits from almost 25 countries worldwide! To date, there have been over 4,300 visits to the website. Since the inception of this campaign, crime rates have dropped significantly.”

To read the full article, click here.

The amount of new “best practices” that have been put in place, and are still underway, need to be shared with the public at large. These have been created as a result of having promised the IOC that London would deliver the greenest games possible.

One such achievement was the cleaning up the the toxic soils that were on the site. Below is a sample of something that we put together while we were there.

Underground station

More than 200 years as a dumpsite for trash, a graveyard for cars and refrigerators, and the final desitination for dry cleaning fluid, paint from a factory, and the effluence of an antiquated sewer system. The creation of Soils Hospital is just one way London is creating The Greenest Games, Ever.

Same caption

Beyond the traditional “pro-fit” services that Damon offers to his customers, he also brings to the table endurance coaching and active recovery, so that his clients can achieve their best performance on the bike. As Luke Mysse, CrossGrain, and I continue to build out the brand tools for DamonFIT, we will add these element to our blog.

To get a professional fit by Damon, please contact him through Surf City Cyclery.

Matt Savage's latest CD release

When Savage Records approached us with the song list, there was a duality between his time spent on his farm in New Hampshire and his time spent in big cities like New York and Boston. Our job was to come up with the look-and-feel for this new album - and all of the collateral that would support it for radio broadcast and performance bookings.

Our final design concepts focused on the idea of traveling between these two places Matt was now calling home. And we were on the hunt for a vintage suitcase that the band members would sign during their recording sessions. Alex Abercrombie, one of our favorite photographers photographed Matt and the suitcase at a selected train station that would create the vibe that we were looking for.

The CD hits the streets in mid-November, but you can hear some of the tracks, or purchase it early on the Savage Records website.

Welcome Home is Matt’s highly anticipated ninth jazz album - recorded, mixed and mastered by the same stellar team as “Hot Ticket”… nine-time Grammy winner Tom Bates and Grammy-nominee Jonathan Wyner.  Welcome Home celebrates the many places Matt now calls “home,” from the country to the city to concerts around the world.  Composed and arranged entirely by Matt, Welcome Home features both a quintet and a trio to showcase Matt’s music.  The quintet lineup reunites Matt with saxophone great Bobby Watson, with whom Matt performed seven years ago.  Bobby Watson is featured on alto sax, Jeremy Pelt on trumpet/flugelhorn, Joris Teepe on bass and Peter Retzlaff on drums.  Several of Matt’s new compositions appear as trio recordings with various configurations comprised of Joris Teepe and Peter Retzlaff as well as longtime bassist, John Funkhouser and drummer, Yoron Israel.  Recorded at Systems Two Recording Studio in Brooklyn, the album features thirteen new and original songs including the five-part Big Apple Suite, inspired by Matt’s landmark musical appearances in Manhattan.  Presently a sophomore at Berklee College of Music, Matt used his campus experience as inspiration for the title track as well as the song, You Are Here.  Welcome Home takes the listener from the cycles of country life to the day-to-night rhythms of a metropolitan city.  “It’s about changing homes incredibly quickly and still calling it home,” says Matt.  “It’s about being suddenly bombarded with information and surrounded by people and then taking a break from that.  It’s about the fear of the inevitable … and the thrill of promise.  It’s about returning home as much as it is about going away.  And, more than anything, it’s about enjoying every minute of it.”