So to help keep the old noggins in tip top condition, we’re hitting up some of our favourite creative mates to find out what inspires them and how they fire up their creativity (so we can steal all their cool ideas and share them with you).
We’re calling this WONDERBRAINS.
Next up we’re hitting up not one, but two brains: the interior design duo Joana Filipe and James Mason behind Interesting Projects, who helped to design the SUPER jazzy Wonderland office as well as exhibitions at the Tate Liverpool and Design Museum in London.
1. What excites you?
A good pain au chocolat, Japanese interiors, technical drawings of mechanical parts, colour catalogues, geeky old model shops and travelling.
2. What scares you?
The end of Europe as we know it, the rise of the right, the misuse of technology, conspiracy theories, the growing distrust in the scientific community, the scary power of data, the idea of getting burgled and being late to the airport.
3. What inspires you?
Going for nature walks, swimming in the sea, looking at good illustration, going to exhibitions, paying attention to the things no one else really notices and those really long dinner chats on life and art.
4. Your top tip for getting creative?
We don’t know if we can just turn our creative thinking on or off, as it’s such an essential part of our daily lives and problem solving. But if “getting creative” means idea generating, then as a studio we always have a change of scenery at the start of a project.  We leave the laptops at the studio and freely sketch together, talking over each other and just try to list out all that it “could be” or what we “don’t want it to be”.
Our top tip: think that everything you do is cumulative to your creative process, and not everything needs to have a final form and purpose. So go and read that book about trees that sparks your interest, or spend an afternoon listening and going through the history of that jazz band you like. It’s after doing that kind of thing that you can make new links and the fun begins!
WONDERLAND GOES WILD (AND BEERY)
