Paradigms 2024: Lasting lessons from the Eternal City
So, Paradigms 2024 happened. At least, we think it was 2024. For a couple of heady Roman days in late September, time became rather harder to fathom — as the Paradigms community congregated once again from many corners of the world to muse, mangiare, and mingle.
Matt Valenzia, Associate Director, Europe at Siegel+Gale our correspondent on the ground, on loan from Global Brand Strategy, Design & Experience firm Siegel+Gale, was on hand to make some observations.
From the moment Frontify’s erudite legal counsel, Michele Romano, opened proceedings on home turf with an ode to the Eternal City, Paradigms 2024 was always going to be a little different from other run-of-the-mill industry events.
We set off to the sound of ABBA, courtesy of Claire Houghton-Price and Kim Nyström of Pophouse Entertainment. The tech-driven trend behind Pophouse’s model is the popularity of iconic rock and pop acts — from ABBA to Queen to Cyndi Lauper and KISS — franchised via music catalog investments and activated as the sleeping-cultural power brands they truly are.
Next, we heard from Leo Porto and Felipe Rocha, the chaps behind PORTO ROCHA. The two are refreshingly down to earth, humble to a point, and wise beyond their frustratingly young years — wisdom that derives from both an eye for the rules, and a knack for “pushing” them. A healthy respect for tradition and then the intuition, willingness and bravery to invert it.
Nick Bell, a founding partner of Ask Us for Ideas (AUFI) and referred to some as the enfant terrible in the agency x brand intermediary space, led an energetic discussion with a panel reflecting AUFI’s network: Bomo Piri (Native Instruments), Iona Carter (Wise), Jolyon Varley (OK Cool) and Leo Porto joined the stage and the group discussion — which centered on the idea that great creativity is always impactful, contextual and decisive. Jolyon perhaps summarized things best when stating that “great work should feel like remembering your favorite movie.” A pleasingly concise reference for this reporter, given Siegel+Gale’s commitment to simplicity.
Egg sandwiches
Industry event lunches are often sad affairs, propped up by soggy egg sandwiches and lukewarm coffee. Not so at Paradigms 2024 (che sorpresa!): Attendees were treated to a spread fit for an emperor, a promising beginning of two days of truly exceptional cuisine.
After lunch, Ana Andjelic restarted proceedings with a carefully structured perspective on how culturally contextual brands are organized before Data Humanist Giorgia Lupi, Partner at Pentagram, took to the stage. Unfiltered passion is a beautiful and powerful thing. Giorgia’s is for data — and it’s infectious. From painstakingly categorizing the symptoms of her struggle with COVID-19 to diarizing personal milestones, it’s hard to know if the real value of Giorgia's beautiful work on data visualization will ever be truly grasped. But it was clear that she was not the only data-lover in the room by the close of her powerhouse talk.
With a program that consisted of data, brand management, entertainment, and creativity, it felt right to wrap up Day One with an end-to-end case study.
Mozilla’s evolution at the hands of JKR, as told by Lisa Smith and Amy Bebbington, is a careful study in audience-centric, long-term brand curation — and it touched upon all of the disciplines and principles so brilliantly set up by each speaker. Amy said it best: “We’re not investing for the next quarter; we’re investing for the next quarter century.” A lesson for any CMO looking to balance brand evolution with their short game.
Matt Klein, Founder of Zine and Head of Foresight at social aggregator Reddit. He’s a Webby-winning writer, but when it comes to taking a cultural pulse, you may as well call him Dr. Klein. Matt’s cautionary tone drew a line between self-censorship, a loss of creative integrity, and control. His call to empathy, community, and selflessness as an antidote to audience capture felt like an apt message, given the creative potential in the room.
Combining Matt’s crystal-gazing with Bomo Piri’s dedication to the power of sound in one morning comes close to capturing the essence of Paradigms, its contributors, and its audience. Framed as a brand experience conference, in reality, Paradigms felt like the table stakes were often the direction of culture itself, guided by the insightful creative principles offered by each speaker. For Bomo,.... at Native Instruments, those principles were emotion (Do you feel something?), narrative (Can you connect to it?), and context (Is it right?).
Philosophical musings
The charming Alec Bec, CEO of It’s Nice That, set a cracking pace through the trends driving much of the work being put out today, reaffirming It’s Nice That’s reputation as industry clairvoyant in, well, the nicest way possible.
Emma Baines, Global Head of Creative at Tony’s Chocolonely, explained how she and her team are giving Big Choco what-for before poet/brand strategist Cam Brandow wove a molecular reminder of our humanity and creative potential, spellbinding the audience with a combination of rhythmic rhetoric, meditation exercises, and philosophical musings.
Brian Collins, Co-founder at COLLINS, and his team were billed to close Paradigms. As a lifelong design student, Brian dialed the audience back into the story of those designers, creators, and visionaries who have gone before — from the Applied Artists of the 1920s through to the present day, punctuated by Collin’s defining work with the likes of Bose, Hershey’s, Figma, and Equinox.
Paradigms has a problem. The closing party keeps getting better. From Barcelona to Lisbon to now the sumptuous Villa Piccolomini with its gardens overlooking the Vatican, Paradigm’s curtain call is gathering a legend of its own. As the two hundred or so guests took their seats, serenaded by the soulful tones of Bomo Piri’s rendition of “Stand by Me,” the crackle of conversation had become incredibly familiar. After two intense, insightful days, effortlessly orchestrated by our hosts, everyone had become close — evidenced by the outpouring of warmth across social media in the days following, as each participant made their way home.
Grazie
There’s something about a fun fact. They’re contagious and simple — in the best way possible. Frontify’s marketing team treated us to some doozies throughout the event: Like, did you know, a marble mask located in Rome’s Church of Santa Maria — legend has it — bites off the hands of liars?
Or perhaps our favorite: Many of Rome’s storm drains, still in working order (working, in fact, overtime during parts of Paradigms), are embossed with the initials SPQR — a Latin abbreviation of “The Senate and the People of Rome.” A simple statement that has stood for over two millennia.
And that’s the thing about simplicity. Like the great work exhibited over the week, simple brands are eternal, balanced, inclusive, universal, and impactful. As the Simplicity Company, Siegel+Gale has delivered those qualities into the heart of its clients’ businesses for over 50 years.
If Rome is one of the world’s most enduring brands, then Paradigms can claim to be 2024’s most sparkling experiences. A mind-bending 48 hours of music, meditation, poetry, great food, more drinks, and, most of all, fantastic creative work.
Grazie Roma. Grazie Paradigms. Grazie Frontify.
