After winning the LVMH Prize, Marques’Almeida‘s international audience grew exponentially. However — in complete contrast to what might have been expected with this new-found global spotlight — the brand is releasing its fall/winter 15 campaign to clients and fans via personal email, tailoring the content based on feedback from each individual.
“Two years ago, we were selling a lot through social media as we didn’t have an online shop,” Marta Marques and Paulo Almeida told i-D, explaining that, “We used to spend lots of time on emails and it was amazing as we ended up knowing more about many clients and also understanding what they liked and how they saw the brand. We really care about interacting with our clients and getting to know them better, so we thought this would be perfect for that!”
The campaign, or maybe more accurately several mini-campaigns, were shot by different photographers and stylists, who are all friends of the designers and were given completely free reign to shoot what they wanted. Photographer Ronan Mckenzie; Alice Neale and Jazmaine; and Tess Yopp and Masha Mel are the creative teams behind the various sets of images. “They are all good clients who ended up becoming also good friends, so we wanted to explore the way they see the brand as they are so different but all have such interesting work,” the founders said.
Sending out an initial email, with just two of the campaign images, the designers asked their pen pals, “Do you want to know more about this campaign? Do you want to see more images or a video? Will you share it and where? What makes you share an image on social media?,” explaining that, “We will personalize what you will see from this campaign depending on your reply to our email so let us know your opinion! Really hope you like it :)”.
As for what i-D emailed — we were intrigued to see Ronan McKenzie’s shots of our very own team members Felicity Kinsella and Francesca Dunn, above. “Chilling out, maxin’, relaxin’, all cool and shooting some Marques’Almeida outside of a corner shop,” Frankie grins. “Shot by friends, for friends, working on the fall/winter campaign was positively dreamy. As fans of the designers, the circle of female friendship is now complete… we love M’A and M’A loves us too,” she says.
Marques’Almeida has kindly allowed us to publish a selection of images in this article, but to feast your eyes on more cool content from the campaign, you’ll have to drop the brand an email — you can contact Head of Communications Rita, who will respond personally to you, on rita@marquesalmeida.com.
Credits
Text Charlotte Gush
Photography Ronan McKenzie