The article is written by Greg Taylor, Director of Brand Provocation at Elmwood, London

It’s that time of year again here in the UK. Our TV screens are being hit with a blizzard of yuletide advertising. The retailers in particular vie for bragging rights as to who has the best ‘Christmas campaign’. This time around, Waitrose and John Lewis particularly struck me. For international readers, Waitrose is the chain of supermarkets of the John Lewis Partnership, which also has a chain of department stores called, you guessed it, ‘John Lewis’. 

The article is written by Greg Taylor, Director of Brand Provocation at Elmwood, London

Having emerged this week from the coldest May for 100 years, the sun has burst through at last and there’s a collective spring in the step of the folks here in Fitzrovia. I never cease to be amazed by the power of nature and its effects on the human psyche. When we experience nature at its best, it magically frees our spirit. Our senses are triggered, we feel more alive, we feel good. But why? And how can we find ways to tap into nature even when the sun doesn’t shine?

The article is written by Greg Taylor, Director of Brand Provocation at Elmwood, London

Here in the UK last week, we hit the first double-dip recession since the 1970s. But there wasn’t wall-to-wall coverage or even that much front-page news. Do we have a collective sense of inevitability? Are we a nation resigned to economic depression? Or do we have a growing determination to take matters into our own hands and build our own futures? Now is the time for each and every one of us to reboot our own ‘home’ economy and build a new ‘homestyle’, a way of living that makes more of the spaces we find ourselves in. After all, home is where the heart is.