MINI Germany worked with Freunde von Freunden from 2014 to 2020. It began with city guides: local creatives showed their city from the driver's seat of a MINI. It grew into portraits for the Clubman launch, coverage of MINI LIVING at design weeks in Milan and Los Angeles, and The Sooner Now, a platform, podcast and event series on the future of urban living.
Alongside the editorial work came a lookbook on the brand DNA, sales events for BMW and MINI across Germany, and work for BMW Cultural Engagement. The stories ran on Freunde von Freunden, on thesoonernow.com and on MINI channels.
Locals showed their city from a MINI. A chef foraging on the edge of Berlin, a photographer reading the Berlin skyline, a lamp collector at a Cologne flea market. Each portrait doubled as a guide to the places behind the work.
The series started in 2014 as city guides in five German cities and ran as Guided and Curated until 2016, with stops in Leipzig and at the Triennial of Photography in Hamburg. Several portraits from late 2015 on featured the new MINI Clubman. Stories: Dylan Watson, Noshe, Thomas Melssen.
The new MINI Clubman launched in late 2015. For the launch, three Italian workshops designed the MINI Gentleman's Collection: sunglasses by TYG in Milan, hats by Super Duper in Florence and a fragrance by Paola Bottai in Rome. Freunde von Freunden portrayed the three makers in their workshops.
In 2016 MINI Germany built its national Clubman campaign on two pairings of the useful and the desirable: the Berlin table makers Bullenberg and the New Zealand band No Wyld. Freunde von Freunden portrayed Bullenberg co-founder Albrecht von Alvensleben in 2015 and again in 2016, driving the Clubman from Berlin to the forests of Saxony-Anhalt. MINI linked the portrait from its own campaign page.
For No Wyld, the production arm FvF Productions filmed the band in New York and built the films around each member's personal story. Their track Let Me Know carried the campaign. The TV spot plays from a third-party upload. Campaign announcement: BMW Group PressClub, “Kombi. Aus nützlich und will ich.” Neue Kampagne von MINI Deutschland für den MINI Clubman startet, 2016.
For Pitti Uomo 90 in 2016, MINI asked five designers to reinterpret the MINI sweatshirt for its Fluid Fashion capsule collection. Freunde von Freunden portrayed Berlin designer Hien Le in Kreuzberg and covered the exhibition in Florence.
A year later, at Pitti Uomo 92, it followed the Berlin label Perret Schaad and their travel pouch for the MINI Fashion Beyond Native collection.
MINI LIVING was the brand's architecture initiative on compact urban housing. Freunde von Freunden accompanied it from 2016: portraits of creative lead Oke Hauser in Berlin and architect Asif Khan in London, Breathe by SO – IL at the 2017 Salone del Mobile, and MINI's creative space A/D/O in Brooklyn.
At the 2018 Salone, Built by All with Studiomama proposed a micro-neighbourhood of four small units around a shared kitchen, garden and gym. Two months later the Urban Cabin, designed with FreelandBuck, stood on a downtown rooftop at the L.A. Design Festival. In Milan and Los Angeles, Freunde von Freunden covered the installations, hosted influencers and helped with invitation management.
All branding and collateral for The Sooner Now. Posters, programmes and invitations move at the pace of city streets. The logo and type mash up serif and sans-serif styles into new letterforms.
The events led to an online platform that keeps the ideas circulating and growing, edited by Freunde von Freunden. The Sooner Now became a monthly podcast on alternative economies, mobility, urban space and the social development of culture.
Social content and channel management ran alongside.
The first edition was a one-day creative conference at the new FvF Friends Space in Kreuzberg on 1 December 2016. In 2017 the format moved into dinners and panels in Munich, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf, Hamburg and Frankfurt. In 2018 it toured with design magazine IDEAT: Hamburg and Berlin in June, Düsseldorf in September, Cologne in October. In Berlin the theme was Kultur in Frauenhand, culture in women’s hands. In 2019 it held day-long festivals in Berlin and Munich.
Guests came from art, design, architecture, gastronomy and sustainability. In Berlin in 2019 a MINI Electric stood in a courtyard taped in neon yellow. Photography by Robert Rieger.
Short films followed the editions, published on Freunde von Freunden and MINI Germany channels. From the first save-the-date to recaps of the 2018 tour and the 2019 festivals in Berlin and Munich.
A coffee-table book on the Lebenswelten, the living worlds, of the new MINI brand DNA. History, style and everyday use, told in spreads that mix archive, studio and street photography.
Freunde von Freunden and MoreSleep also produced sales events for BMW and MINI across Germany.
MINI supported three issues of Companion, the city magazine Freunde von Freunden made with 25hours Hotels, in 2017 and 2018. In 2019 an interview with Paris artist Camille Blatrix was produced with BMW Cultural Engagement, ahead of his Open Work commission for the BMW Lounge at Frieze London.
In December 2020 a MINI Cooper SE took the team to sustainability initiatives around Berlin, from urban gardens to rooftop beehives.
What will cities look and feel like in the near future?
A partnership with MINI Germany from 2014 to 2020, built with Freunde von Freunden. City portraits, the Clubman launch, MINI LIVING at design weeks, The Sooner Now and sales events across Germany.
The question behind The Sooner Now ran through all of it: what will cities look and feel like in the near future? A lookbook on the MINI brand DNA and work for BMW Cultural Engagement complete the picture.