See slide 5 of the presentation for the reason of the hat.

The second presentation of the day this time by myself. Although I must say the six minutes felt like two seconds. I really enjoyed the challenge of talking about my passion of design and climbing in the constraints of Pecha Kucha's format. 20 slides each shown for 20 seconds, no stopping no going back. The cinema space in Chapter is a great place for the event and I thought the second one was even better than the first. For me there seemed to be a bit of a social theme. I spoke very quickly about ARK and it's recent work but there were also a number of other presentations centred around responsibility and the idea of society. Hope people enjoyed it and that you may have been inspired to go climbing :-)

Julian sykes-pk-slide-presentation

View more presentations from julian.

After a few months of planning we have just hosted our second seminar. This time looking at the digital world and how your brand/company lives within it. After the first seminar about Branding strategy was presented by Julian he passed on the baton of responsibilities to Andrew. There were some really great conversations that came out at the end of the event, which was great but we have been thinking it may have been a bit too formal in setup? As you always get with these events their were a few cancellations so we could have probably done a bit more of a workshop based presentation, which may have been a bit more interactive. What did everyone who attend think? If you have any thoughts let us know. always interested to hear feedback.


Andrew discussing the 'social' world


Twitter is growing. 6 million people and counting.

We are aiming to make these events a bit more regular it's just trying to fit them in between work. If you are interested in attending future events then please drop us a line on 029 2048 7941 or tweet us @brandhoffi we look forward to hearing from you. Thanks to everyone who came and hope you got some insights into our thoughts on websites and the social media world and we look forward to seeing you at future events.

Following on from our ongoing work with Rubicon Dance, we are now deep into a branding process with them. Yesterday saw the chance for the full time courses to give us their thoughts of Rubicon and how it could be improved, but also what is good with Rubicon. We got some really interesting insights into their thoughts and through these exercises we will be able to gain a rounded view of Rubicon Dance. Thanks again for everyone who helped us out and contributed to the future of Rubicon.


Rubicon students telling us what they think about Rubicon Dance


Rubicon Students getting creative


One way of reusing our old design weeks and other magazines we have collected over the years

Following on from my blog about Andrew turning 30 here, to try and recapture some of his youth a few of us went Go Karting for his birthday.

I love anything to do with racing so this was the perfect day out for me and I was there to win. Me and Andrew had the usual banter about who was going to win and who is going to get the quickest lap, so when we got there we were allowed a qualifying session to set our grid slot and then on with the race. I was lucky (probably more skill thank luck) to get pole position, with Andrew in 3rd, so on with the race where I led all the way through until the last few laps where Andrew cut me up, taking me off, pushing me down to 2nd and him to 3rd, ruining me race. I hope he is happy with himself, he has ruined what could of been a glittering racing career for me!

It was a brilliant day out though, the SupaKart track in Newport is the best I have been on, quick and with great corners. The only downside is that following on from a gym session, the climbing session and the go karting, i have wrecked my upper body, oh, and i'm also sporting a massive bruise on my back.

Look how happy (and wiped out) we look in the picture and strangly how small Andrew looks???, after the picture was taken i did kill Andrew.

After Julian took me and Andrew climbing for the first time a couple of months ago (see here), i decided to go again yesterday. Having just returned from my second climbing session, and even though I enjoyed it, I can honestly say it's the most frustrating thing I have done in a long time. Like Julian put it tonight, walking, swimming and climbing are the most basic things a human can or should be able to do, so the only way I can put it is - it's like learning to walk again.

At present I don't count myself as being unfit, I have been a regular at the gym for the past 15 months, going on average twice a week, and in that time I have lost weight, toned up a little and been able improve the amount of weight I can push and pull by 300%, but what good has this done me? The frustrating thing about climbing is it's a whole other kind of strength and easily puts you in your place, and that place is the mat in the middle of the bouldering section watching other climbers effortlessly get up a route that I cant. That is another thing about climbing, when you watch a skilled climber go up a route it's the most elegant things, there is no straining or forcing, just a fluid movement up the wall only using the energy you need, while i'm clambering for the holes like my life depends on it.

So I would like to thank a few people, firstly the small child who was climbing better than me (humbled me), secondly the woman who got up a route that I couldn't, came down, gave me a wink and that wink said - i'm smaller than you, twice your age and a woman, but I can do what you can't - (again humbled) and lastly thanks to Julian for taking me, that's him in the picture and if you are wondering why the picture is slightly blurred it's because my hands were shaking after trying to get up a route.

I still maintain I can beat Julian in an arm wrestle, but where it the skill in that?

After Andrew's visit to National Theatre Wales' first play A good night out in the Valleys a couple of months ago. Both myself and Carwyn managed to get out to see National Theatre Wales' first play in Cardiff, The Devil Inside Him. For me it is the first time I have been to the New Theatre since I was a little boy and my parents took me to see Superted, I think at christmas time. I found the play very interesting on a number of levels. Firstly just through thinking about what life was like years ago and also how a seventeen year old could have written something like this.

As well as running around the Bay taking photo's, Carwyn managed to attend the E:DN network setup by ecodesign Wales yesterday. The event was one of the more diverse events so far with a number of designers and other interested groups. We were all asked to contribute to possible Design Camps (see the picture above to see some of the brain-storming), the design camps are planned so that they will co-inside with the Cardiff Design Festival this October.

Today Andrew hit a milestone, a milestone with a big 30 on it! To celebrate (or console him) we bought him some whiskey glasses and some nice steaks. We also have some cake, muffins, doughnuts and some rubbish coffee.

He's dangerous, he's been out and about in the Bay. If you see him can you bring him back. Carwyn has been out and about with Elin taking photo's of the Bay for an up and coming project we have been working on. We have some other photo's of the project that we will be releasing once we get some feedback from our customers.

Andrew reading out the questions for a previous NakedWales pub quiz for the designers in Cardiff, during last years Cardiff Design Festival.

Many of you will know over the last few years we have been working on a community site called Naked Wales which has recently been developed by Andrew into Creative Wales. This week Andrew has been asked along to ARK's creative network meet up, which aims to look into the creative networks in Cardiff and Wales to see if there are things that can be aided through collaboration.

A sample of Carwyn's recent photography.

Always wanting to keep you up to date with what is going on at Hoffi. Carwyn is about to start his new photography course with ffotogallery at the end of the week. The course is going to be for around 10 weeks and he is going to be blogging about his experience of the course on his blog. We all hope that we are not going to be his muse's for the next few months.