Wednesday
Founded: 2004 Based: London, New York Staff: 120 Notable clients: Tory Burch, Mr Porter, Calvin Klein Website: wednesdayagency.com
With a client list including Mr Porter and Calvin Klein , it’s safe to say that Wednesday is something of a slick, stylish operation, making equally slick, stylish products, whether working on website and e-commerce designs, editorial content or integrated campaigns.
It was created in 2009 as an arm of Saturday London, which was founded in 2004 by Jens Grede and Erik Torstensson. Wednesday was formed to focus on the content and online work, but merged with Saturday in 2013 to form a fully integrated creative agency, under the Wednesday banner.
While this may sound slightly confusing, the digital solutions Wednesday creates for its clients are anything but, characterised by beautiful, simple interfaces and usability. “We understand the nuances involved in generating creative ideas that drive desire and demand. We have a reputation for ensuring that established brand-values and aesthetics are beautifully conveyed and appropriately translated into every media,” says Wednesday co-founder Jens Grede.
“The greatest work always combines aesthetics and functionality. Think of the things you love, they tend to have both with each supporting the other. We approach projects collaboratively with our creative, user experience and technical teams in order to solve problems, push boundaries and create new solutions that are beautiful, practical and commercial.”
Wednesday’s work for Mr Porter demonstrates this ably. It set the tone (and the bar incredibly high) for online style retailers that combine e-commerce functionality with brilliant editorial content.
Jens says: “We identified a need in the marketplace for an online men’s style-destination that carried a comprehensive range of brands, and could serve as an authority on men’s style.”
Wednesday pitched the idea to Net-a-Porter, and worked with the site’s team to develop the Mr Porter concept. It went on to create the brand identity, communications strategy, creative strategy, UX and design of the website, and the Founding Members launch campaign. “[Mr Porter] is still hailed as a benchmark, not only within the luxury menswear market, but also in the general fashion and retail industries,” says Jens.
His understandable pride in his work perhaps explains Wednesday’s policy not to enter awards. “We are guns for hire. Our clients’ success is the only accolade we strive for,” he explains.
Another recent project Wednesday and their client was likely rather pleased with is the work for Calvin Klein’s Spring 2015 season – the brand’s “biggest digital launch to date,” according to Jens. The fashion behemoth which has a long tradition of attention-grabbing campaigns featuring provocative imagery were unveiling Justin Bieber as the new face of Calvin Klein Jeans. And while the opportunity to harness the singer’s star power and his army of admiring Beliebers is one heck of a starting point, Wednesday still had to make sure the campaign lived up to its hype and delivered on the quantifiable metrics.
They commissioned Mert Alas and Marcus Piggot to shoot Bieber and Lara Stone, seeded hashtags across social media and worked on the offline collateral too.
“Social media took quick interest and 5.3 million fan impressions appeared within the first six hours of the launch,” Jens says.
“The same afternoon, Calvin Klein was #1 trending on Twitter in 28 countries. Once Justin and Lara shared their images and hashtagged #newfaceofcalvinklein, Lara Stone, Justin Bieber, and Calvin Klein were all trending topics on Twitter worldwide.
“Additionally, in the 24 hours following the launch Calvin Klein gained 159.2k new social followers. The three campaign images shared on Instagram outperformed the brand’s previously most engaged post of all time by 122%.”
It is the wide rage of specialists Wednesday can draw on that allows it to plan and execute such ambitious creative campaigns. It employs 120 people across its London and New York offices, 50 of which work in the creative teams. But Jens explains that they can also call on “a network of the world’s pre-eminent photographers, illustrators, animators and writers which ensures our clients access to a broad range of talent through a single agency group.”
This breadth is paramount to Wednesday’s success.
“Ultimately it is through collaboration between skillsets that we are able to innovate and answer our clients’ briefs. Just as we don’t compromise aesthetics for functionality, we seek solutions that do not compromise functionality for aesthetics – rather we look to them to enhance the visual experience.”
Collaboration, clever thinking and a deep understanding of the client, brief and audience are what makes Wednesday such a respected agency. “We are in an era of rapid technical advancement and that constantly opens new possibilities for digital design and creative thinking,” Jens says.