Started in 1865 in Nashville, TN by two brothers, George and Joe O’Bryan, the Duck Head Brand has since lived through three major wars and survived to tell the tale. The O’Bryan Brothers had a simple idea: Use surplus army tents left over from the Civil War to make pants. This heavy canvas material was known as “duck.” George and Joe, both Civil War veterans and avid outdoorsmen, found the name of this fabric fortuitous and chose it for their company moniker. After a snafu at the Trademark and Registration Office, they added the word “Head,” and an iconic American brand name was hatched. Complete with a mallard logo, naturally.
The new Duck Head is always future-facing, drawing strength, growth, and nourishment from its deep roots in history. It has adapted to fit the lifestyle of the modern Duck Head man and woman. It’s a modern interpretation born from classic inspiration.
Products are only available online which makes the https://www.duckhead.com the most important platform and all marketing activities are geared towards driving traffic there.
Range of retail and e-com packaging examples. Logo's for the TB Found vintage collection and the newly designed Relaxology footwear collection.
As part of the TB brand vision we campaigned every year for a National Relaxation Day —August 15— to become a national holiday. We even contemplated to take it to Washington DC but that never happened. On this particular day TB has Taco trucks driving in a coupe of cities handing out free taco’s. Activities at the stores —giveaways etc— were also part of the program.
We worked together with legendary brand Hackercraft in upstate NY on this customized Tommy Bahama version. Several parts of this beautiful boat were adorned with TB elements and colors. All in a very tasteful manner to not interrupt this classic boat design. More a whisper than a scream.
The look books marked the start of a season. Important support tools for the sales and PR teams, parts of the designs would already hint to the look and feel of the rest of the season. Often these look books would be accompanied by an inspiration piece —a CD, a fold out poster or even specially developed scents— designed in a similar (no pun intended) fashion.
This is the first of two brand video's we did. A little longer —around 3 minutes— then the normal video format we would produce. These video's were used for f.e. investor meetings, internal all company meetings and other occasions where the audience would need a little more education of what the brand was all about. They aimed at illustrating the band's mission and vision: INSPIRE THE WORLD HOW TO RELAX and BECOME THE WORLD'S BIGGEST LIFESTYLE BRAND.
After a delay caused by Hurricane Sandy, the Tommy Bahama flagship store on 5th Avenue, opened at the end of 2012. Architect Michael Neumann designed a 2-story retail space —restaurant upstairs— on the corner of 5th and 45th street, based on the modern beach house concept but with an urban twist. Together with Deb McKeand from Worktable NYC I worked on most of the visual elements that had to adorn the space. That also included some of the exterior such as awnings, logo gilding on the windows and lit signage on the facade. I also commissioned two large art pieces by Jim Olarte —the Modern Beachcomber from laguna Beach— one of them hanging in the open space next to the majestic spiral staircase leading you from the Marlin Bar to the restaurant. The other hanging in one of the dining booths inside the restaurant.
GINZA-TOKYO
The Tommy Bahama Ginza store was a marriage between American East and West coast. After an initial bumpy start the Japanese architect Nomura got it right. It is by far the best rendition of how a Tommy Bahama store should look. A relaxed modern beach house. Retail and restaurant space coexist in a very transparent way, where shoppers can see the diners and vice versa. Some elements of the flagship store in NY where borrowed but with a fresh take on them. F.e. the vintage photo wall became more of a gallery space and the wave sculptor behind the bar in the Marlin Bar in NY was re engineered with a different material. It was not only the architecture that resulted in a nice shopping experience but also the way the store was merchandized and how the Tommy Bahama story was told.
The big spiral staircase is a real majestic piece that connects the marlin Bar with the upstairs restaurant. Partly visible on the right of the staircase is a 24ft tall photo collage, consisting of all found vintage imagery —celebrating the east and the west coast. This wall came together with the help of several public libraries and Tom Adler, publisher of vintage photo books on surfing. Below the complete collage.
Artwork by Jim Olarte. Materials consisted out of driftwood and shells. All found by Jim Olarte on the beaches of Laguna Beach/CA.
This page shows a range of packaging I have worked on while at Hilfiger. Some were in-house, others are external collaborations.
The boxes are transparent bar the printed area on the front. This way the product is very much visible to the buyer.
After breaking the gaffer tape seal, the bottle would slide out the case like a record out of a sleeve.
The grooves on the bottle were obviously inspired by a vinyl record. By printing the product name on the back of the bottle the grooved would also distort the type which gave it that sound wave feeling.
The top of the cap of the LOUD bottle was inspired by a volume dial.
Probably the cheapest label I have ever designed. Just some printing on gaffer tape.
Bottle gets LOUD
This bag was a bit of a puzzle for the production people. Based on the turn-up on the leg of a pair of jeans, we wanted the fold to be real and not a photo printed on paper. The result was pretty amazing and this bag has picked up some awards over time.
This is a real folded turn-up.
This bag was designed when Tommy's book Iconic America launched.
It has a very pop-arty feel.
The second rendering of a Tommy Bahama brand video, expressing the brand's mission —To Inspire The World To Relax. Like the first one this video was aimed at investors and other stakeholder audiences that needed to learn about the attitude of the brand.
These were seasonal theme packages that were distributed company wide. It was a collaborative effort between product design and creative services to map out the new season. Everybody from the product designers to field marketeers or store associates to external PR companies would work from this roadmap to secure a holistic and cohesive look and feel at the start of the new season. This ensures a consistent brand profile wherever and whenever it engages with the fans and the public. Sometimes it was just a poster, then a small video and even specially designed scents came into play.
This book was produced in collaboration with publisher Assouline. It was a large coffee table size ‘scrap’ book with all kinds of interesting and sometimes witty memories of Tommy Hilfiger. Interesting memorabilia from his first People’s Place in Elmira, NY —to later encounters with rockstars who wanted to wear his TH brand.
Tommy Hilfiger showcasing the 25th Anniversary book.
Packaging sketches and proposals for a pitch. Spanish food brand wanted to get away from the look of commodity and conformity that is dormant in this dry goods category. Elevation was the keyword. These where two of my suggestions.
Unfortunately the project was abandoned.
The TH NatGeo campaign was a celebration of the iconic American landscape as Theodore Roosevelt had envisioned it. As an iconic classic American fashion brand we felt that it was the prefect alignment to celebrate iconic America, which was also a book published by the company. This particular campaign was a collaboration with National Geographic who helped us with the content for these brochures. We published 4 brochures. An ice lake in the Yukon —technically Canada, Lake Tahoe —where we raced wooden vintage powerboats and Monument Valley, where the story was featured around ballooning.
The stories were also featured on tommy.com with interactive features where one could zoom in on the earth and visit these particular places and learn of them as well as of the TH collections.
