My first part of the collaboration with Eindhoven based designer, Rene Siebum has been very enjoyable, interesting and informative.
His studio is based within ‘Sectie C’, an area of a former factory, where approximately a couple of hundred creatives have set up their businesses. Bringing together artists, designers and craftspeople working alongside each other, which creates a very inspiring environment that enables for exchange and collaboration. I am looking forward to meeting many of them, which will be a additional benefit and pool of knowledge during my stay.
Rene runs his furniture design and making company by himself which allows for much more transparency for me to see how he runs his business, his strategies, targets etc.
For the first part of our collaboration we focussed on the upcoming exhibition and display for Dutch Design Week, which is the biggest annual event for designers in the Netherlands but attracts also a lot of visitors from abroad.
It will be my first experience attending the event and I never participated myself in a similar event with my own work. He has been part of it for many years and has invaluable experience to share. In his trainings sessions he focussed on the objectives and motivation for him to participate, he laid out his personal goals and targets for the company during that period. We discussed his marketing plan. Furthermore his ideas in terms of display design to maximise the use of the space available and to a achieve a coherent and exciting show, that will reflect his company ethos and show off the products for potential customers. He introduced me to the range of products he will show during the event which will include new and established items. Rene talked me through his website and webshop and we discussed my own business website, that I will be relaunching over the course of the coming months. He will be mentoring this process during our collaboration.
As first part of our collaboration I have been researching and establishing extended marketing options and promotion for his business which was a very important task and lesson for my own marketing plan.
Furthermore I took on the design role of a pop-up shop during the DDW where he will be selling small products.
Rene’s passion and enthusiasm for the field, his creative practice and company are inspiring and I am very much looking forward to working with him the coming months.
