Where Are the New Classics of Tomorrow?

Christian Davies has become as much a part of the brand of VM+SD's International Retail Design Conference as the bustling energy and memorable parties. The vp and creative director at FRCH Design Worldwide will once again grace our podium this fall in Miami Beach. Here is his take on the current state of creativity:

Let me begin with the facts.

We live, work and shop in a time of unprecedented change – a phenomenon affecting each of us in truly remarkable ways.

Our lives in this world are rich, vibrant and multifaceted and we operate on a daily basis in ways unthinkable only a decade ago. Remember life without e-mail?

And yet, as with all zeitgeists, this one comes with a few side effects, one of the most unexpected of which is that we find ourselves in the midst of a drought of contemporary classics.

For the last decade, we have been increasingly pillaging the generations past to the point that it is hard to see anything truly unique in the products and brands that we buy and experience. I recall a millennium exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London that described the 1990s as the decade of reinterpretation. It seems, almost half a decade later, that this spirit never left.

The waves of innovation that swept our culture from the 40s through the 80s are largely gone – and maybe one reason is our relentless thirst for change. The well-documented phenomenon of cultural ADD has become so acute that brands have no time to reach maturity. The lifecycle of products has shortened to unfeasible timelines where creative exploration is the first thing to be cut.

In addition, the demand for financial success has taken us from a spirit of risk-taking bravado to a status quo driven by solutions that are focused-grouped to death. Our world is a commoditized, sanitized set of sound bites – where everything is sort of nice, but nothing really provokes and heaven forbid that it should offend.

This is a time when punk could never happen. When magic is in short supply. Our popular culture is clogged with reruns, rehashes, sequels and reformatting. From “Ocean's 11” to “Charlie's Angels,” from “Alfie” to “Starsky & Hutch,” from “Lord of the Rings” to “Spiderman.” Even “The Da Vinci Code” – tucked under every arm in business class – has its roots in an earlier classic.

The Grammys are polluted every year with either one-hit wonders who can't make it beyond their seminal release (remember Lauren Hill or Macy Gray, anyone?) or graying superstars past their glory releasing albums of other people's staples.

And our newest TV shows are all reworkings of European concepts. “Survivor,” “Big Brother,” “Trading Spaces” – not an original idea among them. Heaven help us when the freshest show on cable turns out to be “Queer Eye.”

In this environment, creativity isn't just being stifled – it's being choked. Where is today's Coco Chanel little black dress? Today's Levi's 501? Today's “Gimme Shelter”? James Bond?

There are glimmers of hope, but they are few and far between. The Audi TT, maybe? But then, the rest of Audi's line looks like metrosexual versions of its nascent sibling Volkswagen, replete with bolted-on plastic and (ooh) “Quattro.”

All of this ubiquity is making the consumer impatient. And I am one of them. You see, I have a passion for classics. My shoe closet alone is full of them – and as a man possessing a shoe count roughly twice that of his wife, my Queer Eye credentials here are impeccable.

And so I ask myself where the new Prada Sport unit bottom is, the new Dr. Martens 1460, the new Timberland 10061, the new Clark's Wallabee? Show me a brand today launching products with this instant recognition. I knew the second I saw each of these that they were classics. I still know that today.

Evidence of the drought is all around us in retail. Nike recently released sales figures proudly championing the sales of a rereleased Air Jordan classic – but where's the new innovation from Portland with the staying power of an idea like Air?

In fact, there were a number of brands applauded by the industry for dusting off their classics in 2003 and getting back to basics – until just before Christmas, when many of them stumbled and the knives came out again. Wall Street cited a lack of originality. And why not, when your strategy for reinvention lies in the past? Trust me, your “classics” can supplement or even outsell your new offerings for a while, but historical precedent suggests survival will depend on you having something else around the corner.

And then there are the stores themselves. Consider the last time you thrilled at a new concept that broke the mold in a way that had a lasting effect on you. Many of us had high hopes for Prada New York, but repeated visits have left us with more of a curio – and one that has hardly aged gracefully. This flagship, championed as “the future of retail,” just seems grimy – despite doing an admirable job of avoiding troublesome details like foot traffic.

Of course there is hope. Just last year, we in the retail world were finally blessed with a “new classic” of our own in Future Systems' work for Selfridges. Of course, Future Systems had been waiting for this opportunity for years. You can see the genesis in its unbuilt proposal for the French National Library, where it came in a devastating second in a field of immensely dull solutions. Here we saw the same amorphous forms, the same daring, the same vision. Thankfully, a decade later the decision-makers in the boardroom have finally caught up.

The responsibility to sustain this momentum lies with each of us, from clients and developers to consultants and designers. Perhaps if we all spend a moment with an eye to the future, we can continue to transform our industry for the consumers that experience it. And please, no more concepts born in the rearview mirror.

For more information on attending or sponsoring the 2004 VM+SD International Retail Design Conference, Sept. 15-17, 2004, at the Loews Miami Beach Hotel, go online at irdconline.com