What do UK architect Will Alsop (see one of his projects here) and marketing guru Seth Godin have in common? A lot, I think!

On Monday, Feb 27^th, Alsop spoke to a buzzing crowd of over 1100 Calgarians jammed into the EPCOR CENTRE’s Jack Singer Concert Hall. His talk was part of Alberta College of Art & Design’s Stirring Culture series.

Alsop dropped jaws in the room with images and videos of his work. Not surprising from a man who said this: 'Our work as architects currently poised to be able to give the world extraordinary objects of design is under threat by people who see the world as a dull and uncultivated place of day-to-day tedium and boredom. Stop them, write them out of your story.' (source)

The post-presentation discussion quickly led to the topic of “iconic buildings.” How does one go about the process of building iconic buildings? Alsop claims he’s not sure. He thinks you can decide that you want to make a statement, but that ultimately it is up to the people of your city to turn your building into an icon by voting with their feet.

Alsop’s approach to designing buildings appears to be about really engaging with the people who will “decide” on iconic status. He showed numerous pictures of sessions with real live people who will use the buildings he builds. He really has to coax them to imagine what the building could be, and he doesn’t appear to be shy about using lubricants like wine and whiskey to do it!

A few days after the Stirring Culture event, I read this blog post by Seth Godin. The post is about Global Warming’s image problem (Warming’s good! Cold is bad! Er, isn’t it?). Considering the potential consequences of Global Warming, Godin looks at why the movement hasn’t gained mass, near hysterical, momentum. If you follow Godin, you’ll know that the answer must lie somewhere in the fact that the issue doesn’t capture people’s imagination, viscerally and personally. Consider this quote:

“Doesn't matter what you market. Human beings want:

totems and icons
meters (put a real-time mpg or co2 meter in every car and watch what happens)
fashion
stories
and pictures

95% of the new ideas that don't spread--even though their founders and fans believe they should--fail because of the list above.”

The Stirring Culture crowd was buzzing because they are passionate about their city, and they’re getting involved in creating the next version of it. Let’s call it Calgary 2.0… As we build and ready the launch this new idea of our city… are we paying attention to Godin’s list? Are we understanding Alsop’s point and truly engaging (with wine and whiskey!) the people we want to fall in love with Calgary 2.0?

ACAD’s Stirring Culture is working on it. The EPCOR CENTRE for the Peforming Arts and the Brilliant City initiative are working on it. imagineCALGARY’s working on it. We’re working on it! AND, we’re working on ways to get more artists to the table… because where else will we get our totems and icons, our fashion, our pictures and our stories?

Who else is going to inspire us?