French Connection presents, “You are...?”

French Connection presents, “You are...?”
Spring Summer 2011 advertising campaign
Are you ready for the challenge?

For Spring 2011 French Connection continues to question what it means to be a Man or a Woman. Our “You are Man?” and “You are Woman?” campaign follows on from the two award winning 2010 campaigns featuring French Connections’ “The Man” and “The Woman”. This season we have decided to challenge our customers in the way they consider themselves. Moving forward from the idealized image of Man and Woman we have created scenarios that confront the viewer with the question “You are Man?” and “You are Woman?”.

For two weeks, French Connection set up THE MAN CAMP on the Isle of Malta and THE WOMAN CAMP on the Isle of Gozo and dared our ambassadors to discover what it meant to be a Man or Woman in the 21st century. Exploring ideas of how gender and society dictate how we are meant to act, we asked them to perform a series of tasks (ride a horse in the sea, look spectacular atop an inflatable animal, dance on piano keys, wrestle a biker, the list goes on) – all of these were captured on film to help define whether “You are Man?” Or “You are Woman?”. We also like to think it pushed the boundaries of fashion photography and was pretty fun too.
We scoured Europe to find ambassadors that represented their sex with the joie de vivre, sophistication and irreverence of French Connection. People who knew their own style, weren’t faddish and were up for experimenting. We think we did quite well.

Our Ambassadors of Manhood: Bertrand Le Pluard We found Bert on the streets of Paris, he described himself: “I’m an image maker, illiterate diarist, suburban freak, 99cents oracle, hippie whore, style remedy, digitalcrash, socialized hermit and ego shaman...” We think that says it all. Daniel Hills Dan was discovered lurking on the streets of London. He is a surfer, famed polymath and a musician in a band called Friendship. Paul Hamy A French-American Artist based in Paris. Paul was one of the founders of the French Arts collective Pain-O-Chokolat and when he finds time models for Marc Jacobs and Yves Saint Laurent.

Our Ambassadors of Womanhood: Ludmilla Dom Perigon We found Ludmilla in Paris. She loves horses (which are sadly in scant supply in the city of light) and she can also play the piano with her feet. Clever girl. Simone Van Werkhoven Has an amazing name. Simone is achingly hip and hails from Holland but lives around the corner from Ludmilla in Paris. Eden Clarke Eden grew up on the glamorous Isle of White and occasionally appears on the cover of Vogue. Polina Sova Loves to speak Norwegian mingled with Russian as she graffiti’s in East London. She learnt to roller-skate powered by fire extinguishers for our short films.

French Connection worked again with photography and film collective Blinkk, 192 Productions and the creative team at Fallon. The team created over 60 original shots and 6 short films that capture the spirit of Femininity and Masculinity.
To compliment the campaign French Connection will be launching a global Film competition in March 2011 to discover if people really are Man and WOMAN enough? The films will be broadcast throughout the world commencing April 1st 2011.

The campaign launches online on the 1st of February 2011 and globally on the 7th February 2011
Awards & Nominations for the Winter 2010 Campaign – Campaign Magazine Big Awards 2010, Drapers Fashion Awards 2010, High Street Fashion Awards 2010, ANNA Print Advertising Awards 2010.

www.frenchconnection.com