Cool & Marbelous
An interview with a Creative Design Studio
By Rainer Von Helin on Oct 1, 2014
Cool & Marbelous is a creative design studio based in Marbella, Spain. Two extremely creative good life lovers founded it back in 2011. They started by sharing visual inspirations and rapidly gained popularity online, allowing them to venture into graphic design, art direction, product design, interior design and everything else related to branding. Cool & Marbelous’s visually stunning approach to creativity is helping brands reinvent themselves by adopting the unique spirit of Marbella and its coolness. Here’s our chat with the creative design studio.
Hēdonē: What is Cool & Marbelous and how did it all start?
Cool & Marbelous: Cool & Marbelous is a new concept of Creative Graphic Studio. We started 3 years ago with an inspiration blog, posting about creativity, design, art and cool places around the world. After receiving much popularity with many followers, a year ago, we began to receive first real case enquiries so we started offering services in Graphic Design, Art direction and Digital Communication. We are two young guys from Marbella passionate about details and the good life. Jm is the Graphic Designer and the Art Director. Itziar is the Account Manager and the Communication Director. Both with a creative mind and an edge for detail have graduated in Marketing & PR.
What is your agency's philosophy when it comes to staying cool?
Our goal is the detail, we focus on the very small things that can make the diference with the competition. Our style is not very common in Spain which is an advantage for us. We deal with clients in a more relaxed manner but always staying professional.
How would you describe the creative market in Marbella at the moment?
Well, Marbella isn't a big city so the creative market over here is not as original as in a big city but we think it's growing a community with creative people. Clothing designers, singers, DJs and everyone that likes the alternative world. We hope this community gets bigger so we can collaborate with each other. That would just be amazing for Marbella.
Describe a usual day at your office?
First of all, every day we write down a quote on a big board that motivate us to have an amazing day and to leave all the bad vibes outside from it. The music is never missed in the space: hip hop, chill out, deep house, everything but commercial tracks. Every day is a new story, some days we are working with graphic design, others with strategy for the social media and other days meeting with clients and of course, time for inspiration. It is very important for us to get inspiration every day to keep our mind active.
Name some cool branding that you've seen lately?
Penson is an award-winning interior design firm that help businesses to achieve their "cultural and commercial ambitions" by replacing dull and ineffcient spaces with those that are beautiful and intelligent. Penson's new visual identity, developed by London based design studio She Was Only to coincide with the firm's 10th anniversary, delivers what the studio describe as a "clean and confident solution", consistently executed, that better reflects the firm's high quality projects.
Flamingo Market Place, concept store in Puerto Banus, Marbella
All photos courtesy of Cool & Marbelous
Where do you get your photography?
Most of the pictures have been taken by ourselves but we also get some inspiration online. Our Instagram account @coolmarbelous is just our own content but the other social media we mix it, inspiration plus our own content.
You're now also venturing into fashion: tell us about your Homiēs Marbella designs and where can we get them?
We are fashion lovers so we decided we can start our own clothing brand because we have all the resources: taste, knowledge in design and the popularity to share our creations, the only thing missing is the money (laugh). We started the Homies Marbella brand with a fake on Instagram to see the reaction of the people, the response was totally awesome, so we decided to shoot! Why not, right?
An anecdote to sum up the Homies Marbella philosophy: some girls from Germany contacted us because they saw a common friend wearing the t-shirt in a club so we met with them and two days later one of the girls came with us to our official Homies Marbella photo shoot and she was just amazing. We like to be friendly and to have good vibes with everyone. So one day you can be our customer and the day after our Homie. You can get the Homies Marbella products directly from us: aloha@coolmarbelous.com. We are also currently working on the online shop site.
As a creative design studio, what interesting projects have you worked on?
One of the latest branding project that we had was Flamingo Market Place, the new concept store in Puerto Banus. We deeply enjoyed working on the project because we connected with the values of the brand. We clicked so much that the result was incredible. We took care of the logo, business cards, bags, envelopes, tags, corporate colours, etc.
In terms of Digital Communication we want to highlight the Social Media of Ocean Club Marbella. The Instagram Account
@oceanclubmarbella is done with a special touch, every image is selected with a reason so all the gallery seems harmonious and clean. Every quote under the pictures represent a style. The style that we want Ocean Club Marbella to have in accordance with our client.
What's the key ingredient to successful branding?
Branding is like a personality, so the best thing is to be the best version of you. For every project we try to make the best of what our client is going to offer to their customers. So basically, we like to keep it simple, work on details, and of course a good branding is reflected by its consistency and continuity. A good branding has to have the power to make brand lovers, not just costumers and that's the ultimate goal when we are talking about branding.
What is Cool & Marbelous's ultimate pleasure?
We want to grow, but step by step. We are happy doing what we love, but we are also ambitious, so we want to grow as much as we can. We don't have limits, right now we are trying to make a name in Marbella, and trying to share our knowledge with the people who trust in our services. We have a lot of ideas for the future. Our next trip is going to be an inspirational trip, we are going to Tokyo for a month to refresh our mind with a new culture and new ways to make business.
Follow Cool & Marbelous:
Pinterest coolmarbelous
Instagram @coolmarbelous