I have finally managed to move to New York. After five years of visiting, going in and out, back and forth I can now finally settle in. With a green card in my hand I can stay here forever and work for whoever.

It is a new life. New apartment. New furniture. I can try to do what I did in Denmark. Or I can start over. Start off in a new direction. I haven’t decided exactly what I want to do. But I have some small steps I need to do.

_I’m implementing a new visual identity for my own projects and my company. Also, this website needs a make-over.

_I’m starting a few new projects: Johnny Revolver, a photo agency for danish photographers. Ideas Are Nothing, a blog about ideation and effectuation. Better Slides, a resource and consultancy to help presenters improve their slide shows.

I’m busting with fresh energy. I feel I’m at the perfect time of my life. Ready to really kick start some cool stuff. Check out this little video. It gives you an idea of how I feel.

You know how it looks. Corporate photography. You see it in company brochures. On company websites. Usually real employees exposed in very unnatural situations. Carefully instructed by the photographer. Always very aware of the camera and the flashing studio strobes. Always smiling like lunatics – although never enough to cover up for their anxiety about the whole situation. As a professional photographer I can see that these photos are usually of very high technical quality. The lighting of the scene is close to perfect. Not a single unwanted shadow or highlight. Everything is sharp. Crystal clear. My colleagues are as professional as I am, and they do their jobs very well.
_
Nonetheless, these photos are so incredibly boring. So polished and fake. I don’t blame my photo colleagues. I just wondered what would happen if a corporate client was willing to try something different. And then it happened. While my current employer (idea- and design agency Hatch & Bloom) was developing the new visual identity for Fibertex Personal Care we wanted to do something different, and luckily the client was brave enough to trust us. The art director suggested a much more authentic, contrasty, black/white, soft focus style, and from a photo brief the client agreed to try it. I spent a day at their facility in Aalborg, walking around with my camera, talking to employees and clicking around 700 frames. Large apertures gave the photos a soft look. Also, the exposure times were short enough to avoid general blur, while maintaining a feel of activity in rapid movements. Most of all, however, the photos show real employees, actually working. Dedicated to their jobs. And that is exactly what we wanted to communicate.
_
In post production I worked a lot with contrast and also added a small amount of film grain, but that is all icing on the cake. What makes this case special is that technical photographic perfection was exchanged for authentic and dedicated workers.
_
The CEO of Fibertex is a hobby photographer, and after her saw the photos in the first draft of the corporate brochure, he requested to have my raw files for review. He simply loved the look and feel so much that he also wanted to see the rejected frames.
_
I am very happy that Fibertex had so much trust in me, and I am proud to show the results. Thank you for trusting in my fabric.

Writing is the process of putting your thoughts onto paper. I do this all the time. I write notes. Articles. Thoughts. Ideas. E-mails. I need to share some thoughts on the subject of writing, my writing tools and how they influence the process.

My handwriting is – and has always been – absolutely terrible. I just never really figured it out. Instead I have done most of my writing on a computer. I learned it around 1994 when I was about nine years old using Corel WordPerfect 6.1. Today, using a word processing program seems like a natural extension of my hand. However, I have also discovered that my choice of writing tool greatly influences my writing process.

Around 1997 I switched from WordPerfect to Microsoft Word 97 (you might remember the introduction of the famous Office Assistant – that tiny little animated paperclip that constantly disturbed you while you tried to use the program). Despite the stupid office assistant, I learned to love Word and I became a bit of a super-user. I developed my own templates, and worked a lot with layout, columns and advanced formatting features. I honestly don’t have anything bad to say about Word 2007 – the latest version I have personally used. It is a fantastic piece of software with a very sleek, minimalist interface.

The only problem I have with a program like Word is this: I feel it forces me to combine the writing and the editing process. E.g. when I type it starts underlining my typos with red lines, which distracts me from the writing. I stop. Go back. Correct the typo and then I have to start writing again. There are also many formatting tools that I would rather not have available when I write my first drafts. Finally, since it is on a computer, there is always the beep of the new e-mail or IM, and of course you also need to check Facebook for any new updates. Again, distractions from the writing.

At some point I started practicing my handwriting. I felt I needed another tool for writing drafts, than what Word could provide me with. I also bought a typewriter (see the picture above). The typewriter is fun, but it makes a lot of noise and it is way to heavy to use outside of my home.

Then one day at a seminar, someone introduced me to the concept of Zenware i.e. software with a distraction-free design approach inspired by Zen. She explained how she used WriteRoom for OS X, and said that there were two Windows clones of the program called DarkRoom and WriteMonkey respectively. All of them were full-screen plain text word processors with a minimal set of features. I was very skeptical at first, but it quickly started to make sense. I loved the typewriter feeling of the programs. WriteMonkey even comes with different sound schemes that gives the illusion of typing on an old Remington or Olympia typewriter. I still used Word for the editing, but I always used WriteMonkey for the first drafts.

I have recently switched from a ThinkPad running Windows to the latest MacBook Air, so I have had to give up WriteMonkey. I never loved WriteRoom as much so I have been looking for a similar program and stumbled upon a little program called Bean. It has some layout features but you can create plain text documents and avoid it, and you have the same full screen interface.

Try for yourself: Bean for OS X, WriteRoom for OS X or WriteMonkey for Windows.

Today I use Indesign for layout. Goodbye Microsoft Word.

Just bought an old school label-maker from DYMO.com today. Nothing more to say.

A few things have happened. I just turned 25. I am no longer a student. I have a job. Two actually. And yet I’m about to leave it all behind.

I have successfully managed to finish my studies and can now proudly present myself with an academic title of Cand.it – even though the moment where I choose to present myself that way, has yet to come. However, it feels very good to finish something (I failed my last exam and had to do it again. The photo above was taken the day I handed in the paper that I thought would be my last – but I was wrong).

Before I graduated I was offered a new job: teaching video editing and Flash animation at OOOJA. This is a quarterly two-week class that I enjoy very much. Nevertheless, two weeks later, I was also offered another job doing concept development with an idea- and design agency called Hatch & Bloom. This is also very interesting and this job currently takes up most of my hours.

And finally, my green card process, which I started preparing about two and a half years ago, seems to be coming to an end: within the next months I will most likely receive my US legal permanent resident status. This means that I can live and work in New York indefinitely. But it also means that I will have to move from Denmark. Give up my job and start a new life.

I am always in the making.

_

_

This website is an unfinished and messy archive of most of the things I have done in the past. Everything from my portfolio of websites, talks, teaching and photography.

“I bought my first laptop in spring 2001. It was a hand me down Digital HiNote Ultra 2000, with 4gb harddrive and 64mb ram. Any computer experience prior to this did not count. A laptop computer was what I needed.

Spring 2002, I bought my second laptop. An Acer Travelmate 360. My first (and to date most expensive) new laptop computer. It was sleek and lightweight compared to the standards at the time and featured a 20gb harddrive and a 13″ screen and I loved it.

But the happy times did not sustain, and during the summer of 2003 I bought my first IBM ThinkPad: the X31. Not much faster than the Acer, but smaller, with a 12″ screen and a much better keyboard.

After the X31 I knew I was never going to use anything but IBM ThinkPads, so a year later I bought my second one: an X40. Even lighter than the X31 and with a much longer battery life.

The X40 was the first computer I used for more than two years. It had almost everything that I needed – and actually, my sister bought it from me when in fall 2006 I bought an X60s, and she still uses it.

But in spring 2005 I also bought an Apple PowerBook G4 15″. Not as a replacement or substitute for the X40 but as a second computer. With a larger screen, larger disk and an optical drive, the PowerBook was ideal for music and video editing, which I was doing around that time (read more about the movie ‘Udsat’ here).

The PowerBook lived a quiet life, while the X60s travelled with me to New York and basically everywhere I went.

In fall 2008 I also acquired an X61 Tablet with built in digitizer for photoshopping, however, it was too heavy to replace my personal favourite (I sold it about a year later), the X60s, so instead I replaced the X60s with an X200s, setting new records for battery life: 11 hours was no problem on the X200s (with a new battery).

Around that time I also developed a rather irrational passion for the 17″ PowerBook. For some reason I just fell in love with its odd proportions – so big and so flat. I couldn’t get my hands on the old PowerBook so I bought a used 17″ MacBook Pro to replace the 15″ Powerbook.

Things are getting confusing, I know. For the past years I have used the Thinkpad X200s as my primary machine, the 17″ MBP for home and the iMac for photography, however, when Apple introduced the 2nd generation MacBook Air with 256gb SSD I sold my last Thinkpad and I am now all mac. Not cool, I know. But the Thinkpads have not evolved fast enough after Lenovo took over, and my needs have changed. I still miss the trackpoint and the keyboard from the Thinkpad. Thinkpad FOREVER!

What can a journalist learn from a panel of entrepreneurs?

Today I gave a talk at Fagfestival – the biennial two day conference for 1200 danish journalists. The subject was how to build your own media empire. The reason I was invited, was my Fashion Week Live project.

I think the most important thing a journalist can learn from an entrepreneur is to go out and do something. You don’t need to work for a major newspaper to create great stories today. Maybe you should still work for a newspaper to pay rent etc. but today, with rapidly declining newspaper sales, and a boom in superficial 24 hour CNN-news, there are still many emerging markets for high quality and super-specific journalistic content. Fashion Week Live is only relevant to very few people two times a year. The rest of the year it is closed.

Another important point is that technical skills are not necessary. Everyone can start a blog and even without fancy technology it can become popular as long as the content is sharp and relevant.

Together with me in the panel was also Caroline Meldgaard – the founder of bornibyen.dk (about activities for parents and kids in urban Copenhagen).

Opening: Signs Of Time exhibition
My first photo exhibition. February 2010.

About networking (DK)
Interview with Væksthus Midtjylland. September 2009.

About me (DK)
Interview with MyMission. March 2009.

Comapilot backstage photoshoot (DK)
Webisode by Comapilot. September 2010.

Berlin backstage photoshoot
How I work. March 2010.

Phucisme photoshoot
How I work. June 2010.

About Firmafon (DK)
Interview about Firmafon. February 2010.

Why I’m an entrepreneur (DK)
Interview with Niklas Stephenson. January 2010.

Another day at the office
Where I work. April 2010.

Puzzle time-lapse
No description. May 2010.

What happens when you combine commercial entrepreneurship and fine art? For me there are two simultaneous directions.

1: Entrepreneurship influences art. This will in turn make the art more commercial. The artist is no longer a fragile soul inspired by forces beyond. If and artist wants to make an impression on the world, she must accept the rules of the game, and the fact that art today is just a more sophisticated product. Produced and sold. Play the game. Examples of this direction includes the fantastic I’m Ivan book and photo exhibition.

2: Art influences entrepreneurship. In the fantasy world, art is done for the art itself. Of course this is not always the case, however, even in a less idealistic version it is still far from the commercial ideal of accumulated profits. I see this as a general artist attitude. An attitude towards every creative project. This attitude can influence entrepreneurship. This is the direction that I am mostly engaged in. In projects like GadeMode and Fashion Week Live, we never started with commercial interests. We started with an idea about creating something. That was were the energy came from. Of course these projects can evolve and become commercial later, but the point remains: they started without it. This, I think can lead to many more successful entrepreneurial projects than most businessplans ever will.

This one hour presentation was given to 80 teachers from Tradium – The Danish Academy of Business and Technology.

My website has been closed for more than two months now. Here is what happened.

Around June 16th I felt the pressure to communicate my life to the world through Facebook, Twitter and this website was too much. I was unsure of what I was actually doing and what I wanted to do. So I stopped. First of all I stopped all social media activities. No more distractions. I turned off my cell phone and put a message on my website to contact me through e-mail. I decided to check my e-mail only once a day.

This created a mental room for thinking without constant distractions.

I’m not done with thinking and I still need to avoid many distractions – but I have decided to reopen my website and I’m slowly starting to use Twitter and Facebook again.

Recent updates from my life include: I have finished my MA degree in Information Studies and in August we did another round of Fashion Week Live.

I’m still rediscovering myself and trying to figure out what I want to do with my life in the future. I’m not close to any conclusions yet and thus I have decided to keep this reopened website very minimal and unfinished. As I progress in my search I will gradually rebuild it by adding more items to the top menu.

If you have any suggestions on what I could and/or should do with my life, please e-mail me: m@mathiasvestergaard.com.

Today I’ve been in Vejle – a 40 minute train ride south of Århus. I had been invited to give a short inspirational talk about myself and how I use Facebook – and to moderate a Q&A session with Facebook Denmark Account Excecutive Jan Christiansen.
Photos of people giving presentations are always bad – usually a dark silhoutte in front of a brightly lit yet still unreadable PowerPoint projection. Today I wanted to take a new approach and so I shot a photo from my point of view – so you can see some of the attendees.

Layout: Jo Bak Larsen

Photography: Mathias Vestergaard

Client: Ninna Gøtzsche Ceramics

Almost two years ago, in June 2008, I helped my good friend and co-entrepreneur Andreas Lemche launch Eventuelt.org. An online gudie to (sub)cultural events in Århus. Like my own street style project GadeMode.dk, Eventuelt.org has grown and changed considerably since then.

Now, Eventuelt.org is a full blown guide to help you get the most out of your city (if you happen to live here). With a team of 15 contributors covering everything from food and theater to nightlife and events you won’t be left behind – and with a strong focus on tight and to-the-point language the site won’t be wasting your time either. It’s about high quality and journalists with an opinion.
Today Eventuelt is relaunching itself with a brand new visual profile and an even tighter focus on high quality content.
As a new feature on the site, Andreas has invited 10 interesting profiles – local musicians, artists and entrepreneurs – to blog about their daily lives in a short and almost Twitteresque format: what have you done today? Among these profiles you’ll find my name and my contributions about recent photo shoots, interviews, talks etc.
I really look forward to this new Eventuelt and I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I will.
Visit Eventuelt.org

I write about food, drinks, fashion, design and random ideas. Nonetheless, occasionally someone also writes about me and about what I do. In this section, you will find some references to press clippings about me. However, due to copyright restrictions I’m not able to share the content with you directly.

• April 9th, 2010: Interview in Dagbladet Information about youth culture, work and life.
• February 1st, 2010: Interview in URBAN about my participation in a book about my generation.
• October 29th, 2008: Interview in Kristeligt Dagblad about the death of my mother in 1999.
• October, 2008: Article about IT forum Midtjylland Event ’08, from Katrinebjerg Nyt
• September 1st, 2008: Interview in Delfinen about my book on fashion theory (student magazine)
• August 1st, 2008: About the contributors in Costume (fashion magazine)
• July 29th, 2008: Live interview on P4 about men wearing sandals
• March 10th, 2008: Interview in DR1 about my street fashion blog (national television news)
• March 9th, 2008: Interview in Politiken about my street fashion blog (newspaper)
• November 1st, 2007: Interview in Kontekst about my street fashion blog (student magazine)
• September 2nd, 2007: Interview on TV2 Østjylland about my street fashion blog  (local television news)
• June 6th, 2007: Interview in Urban about my street fashion blog (local newspaper)
• February, 2003: Interview on TV2 Østjylland (local television news)
• February, 2003: Interview in JP Århus (local newspaper)
• January 29th, 2003: Interview in Computerworld Online about being young and an entrepreneur (Online technology paper)
• 2002: Interview on TV2 Østjylland about psychological aid for kids who have lost a parent to cancer (local television news)

I’m skipping any attempt to define myself in terms of what I do.

Basically I’m living my life.

However, in the past I have been an independent writer, a self-employed web developer and it-specialist, I hold a MA in Information Studies/Cognitive Semiotics, and I have been a teacher in interactive multimedia production.

This website is an archive of my past and present productions. Feel free to browse around.

Download my resume/bio (pdf) or contact me.

I have not always been a full-time photographer. My portfolio is an diverse archive of articles, fashion show reviews, websites and a couple of short movies. Each element has a picture, a heading, an explanatory text and a link to the actual piece.

Some of the interesting elements in my portfolio, include articles for Dansk Daily (The Official Copenhagen Fashion Week newspaper), a website for a Berlin fashion store. From the archives I recommend, you take a look at some of the e-learning systems I have worked with, and if you can read Danish, I also recommend that you read some of my restaurant and cocktail bar reviews.

My portfolio is structured into different categories. Henceforth, you can browse by type, theme and publication. Here, you can also find my exam papers organised by date of publication. From each post you can move on to similar projects by following the “see also” links at the end of each post.

Click here to browse the archives.

Portrait. Natural light.  Minimum retouch.

Portrait. Studio. Clean background.

Portrait. Shot on film to get a grainy surface and old school feel. No retouch. Location: train.

Studio portrait. Background color to match company (Stephenson & Co.) color profile. Minimum retouch.

Portrait shot on film with a plastic camera to get a unique “lomo” look. Location: Hudson River Park, New York.

Full figure portrait and cd cover for jazz musician Andy Scott. Location: SoHo, New York.

Photo exhibition by Mathias Vestergaard
Hatch & Bloom Gallery
Vesterbro Torv 1-3, 3. sal
8000 Århus C
February 26th to April 23rd.

Click here to see all the photos. Prices available on request.

Video from the opening.

Yesterday I talked about my favorite subject (myself) at Pecha Kucha Night, Århus.

Pecha Kucha is a presentation technique where you have 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide. You can check out my slides here.

Street fashion shot for Gademode.dk, Dagbladet Politiken and Euroman.

My photos have been featured in Chinese Magazine DONGXI.

The ‘street style’ photographic style has also been used for a fashion campaign for Only.

Yesterday I celebrated the opening of my first solo exhibition: Signs Of Time.

It took me about a year from the first idea until I arrived at the final result, but it has been a wonderful journey. Thanks to everyone who showed up last night at Htch & Bloom Gallery.

The photos can be seen at live at the gallery until March 26th and are available online at www.mathiasvestergaard.com/signs. Prices available on request.

It all started as a weird question in my head: how can you make the best, most interesting and most updated magazine about fashion week?

At GadeMode.dk we have been writing about Copenhagen Fashion Week for the past two seasons, however, our coverage has only been sporadic and based on the interests of our team of photographers. In January 2010 I felt it was time to do something more cool. I wanted to produce at separate online magazine specifically about fashion week with an (almost) live stream of content. I set up a few basic premises: (1) everything must be online within an hour after it took place, (2) everything must be professional (3) the magazine should cover everything from shows, events, fashion fairs and street style, (4) the magazine should be independent of fashion industry sponsors.
Then I started recruiting people to help me. First I asked Sofie Hallas if she wanted to help out as a primary coordinator and editor, and from there it went crazy. Sofie and I met only three weeks before fashion week started, and we had nothing but this crazy idea. Additionally I also had a Master’s thesis that I needed to finish so I didn’t have time for a full time commitment. We set up our temporary headquarters at Yellow Cock Studio, and while Sofie took charge of coordinating invites to all the different shows, I recruited more people. Within the first week we had access to 80% of all the shows and a staff of 15 dedicated fashion journalists and photographers, one professional proof reader and a really cool driver. We also found a name: Fashion Week Live was born.
Then we started working on non-fashion-industry sponsors and got a free phone-system to handle incoming calls, 3G internet to allow the journalists to upload text and photos directly from the venues, and a huge office in central Copenhagen that we could use as a temporary base during the week. We produced business cards, banners, logos for our car, and prepared.

So what is Fashion Week Live? Is it another fashion blog? Is it a magazine?

So what is Fashion Week Live? Is it another fashion blog? Is it a magazine? To me it has elements of both: we have the professional organization of big a magazine with efficient transport, an information infrastructure, procedures, professional proof reading and a huge team of journalists and photographers, but we also have the independence and speed of a blog. We can publish almost instantly and we have no sponsors or advertisers with conflicting interests.

The result? Fashionweeklive.dk opened on February 9th, and without spending a single dollar on advertisements we had more than 60.000 page views in the following week, with record low bounce rates. We produced 124 professional posts with more than 1000 photos.

If you want to hear more about Fashion Week Live, entrepreneurship, leadership and volunteer projects, I’m available for inspirational talks.

Posterous is an online service that allows you to run a blog simply by e-mailing stuff to the site.

I have been using Posterous for half a year now and I really like the informal structur and the way it handles everything from videos, photo galleries, sound, pdf’s etc.

You can follow my live stream of random content on here.

I will also integrate the stream into the website.

This month Chinese magazine Shopper features a special edition of some of the best street style photos from GadeMode.

All photos are by Mathias Vestergaard.

See more pages here

In this new book future researcher Anne-Marie Dahl and teacher at Grenaa Gymnasium Oluf Kjær Nielsen depicts an image of the new generation called The Popstar Generation.

Their focus is the young generation who have been raised with a n enormous amount of media fantasies and a surplus of opportunities and choices. How do they act in the workplace? The book explores the question through case studies of remarkable youngsters. I was one of them.

The book is no revolution for other youngsters – they are well aware of the trends. However, the target group for the book is the 50+ year old CEO who wants to understand her younger employees and their life world.

You can order the book here.

Interview with me in Dagbladet Information.

You can also read this interview with me in URBAN.

One should be allowed to dream. My dream right now is something like this:
First of all I have established a New York based company – Mathias Vestergaard LLC or something. This company does the same as my Denmark-company: photography, writing and web development.
It is located in a huge loft/studio in SoHo – furnished in line with Yellow Cock Studio in Denmark. In addition to being my home in New York, it’s also huge enough to house a professional photo studio with light and editing equipment. When I’m not in New York the apartment will be available for vacation rental on a daily and weekly basis. Also, the photostudio is available for a daily rental.

N.B. the above description is just a dream. It has not been realized (yet). However, for the past weeks I have actually been working on something like this. I have seen some potential places and filed a petition for immigration so hopefully I can get a work permit.

Johnny Revolver is the name of a new jewelry collection for men, inspired by the legendary serial killer.Only very little is known about Johnny Revolver. A few books claim to have sources documenting his lige as a hitman in London in the mid 1800s. In the final chapter of J. S. Cockburn ‘Crime In England’ (1977) he mentions Johnny and claims that he lived from around 1835 to 1895, although his dead was never confirmed. As a whore child he grew up in a home for abandoned kids but escaped when he was a teenager and lived the rest of his life alone. In the more recent book ‘Serial Killers’ by P. Vronsky (2004) additional evidence links Johnny Revolver to a series of murders where the bodies were found with a black chain around their neck and a black rose in their hand.

The line of jewelry is inspired by the descriptions of the necklaces found on the dead bodies. It will be available for sale in stores and online before Christmas 2009 at prices starting around $200 / 1000DKK.

To learn more, please visit www.johnnyrevolver.com

Mathias Vestergaard operates globally with administrative headquarters in Aarhus, Denmark. 

We have chosen the exclusive and internationally recognized Yellow Cock Studio as a premium business network, sharing office space and professional photo studio with creative talents like photographer Thomas C K Priskorn, art director Ivan Hvam Hvam and artist Jaroslav Dorma.

Feel free to drop by the studio if you have any questions or new ideas or if you want to try one of our new products: CoffeeMeeting.

Read more about Yellow Cock Studio.

Read more about the team behind Mathias Vestergaard.

During 2009 Mathias Vestergaard™ was team of three. In addition to myself, the team included two part-time assistants: Tone Frank Dandanell and Lina Søgaard Nielsen. 

Lina handled a lot of administrative tasks and is also an excellent photographer. Tone was a great writer and was responsible for the product Ghostwriter. During the summer of 2009, PR manager and publicist Marlo Saalmink was also hired to promote the photo exhibition ‘Signs Of Time’.

Lina is now exclusively involved in running GadeMode.dk, while Tone has decided to focus her energy on her studies.

If you want to become part of the team, please send your resume and a description of what you can do to m@mathiasvestergaard.com. All applicants will receive an answer.

Have you got a project you want to discuss? Do you have a good idea? Are you confused about your future? Or do you want to know more about something I do? Even if you don’t have anything specific you want to talk about, we can always meet up for coffee anyway.
For me, life is all about people. I love to meet cool and inspiring people.

So let’s have coffee and see what happens!

Price: FREE!

Download product sheet: CoffeeMeeting (English)

You can have profiles on Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, Facebook, K-forum, Younoodle and more than a million other social networking sites. I can’t even keep track of them anymore, and yet I keep creating new profiles. Now Google has created an official Google Profile-system.

Do you need it? I don’t know. But I want to do everything I can to make my personal brand easy to find. Check it out and see for yourself.

Check out my profile on Google.

I’ve had my own company for the past eight years – since I was just 17 years old. There was no master plan. It sort of just happened.

I did web development projects for clients and was paid an hourly wage almost 10 times higher than my classmates. I never really considered it to be more than a fun game with $25K in yearly turnover.

After high school I could probably have lived a decent life with a nice income, but I decided to take an education, and within the next year I will probably get my Master’s degree in Information Studies (I’m writing my thesis this fall).

My business has developed, but I never wanted to be self-employed. I wanted to have coworkers, a nice office and a steady income. Then recently things have started to change. First I realized that I wasn’t actually willing to compromise on my very flexible schedule where I can work  only when I feel like it. Also, I realized that I’m way to independent to fit into a corporate culture. I felt I was stuck in the middle. I wouldn’t comply but I still wasn’t sure if I wanted to be self-employed. Then I decided to move my business out of my home and into my new office at Yellow Cock Studio. I also hired my first personal assistant, and I realized that this could actually work in the long run. At Yellow Cock I met interesting people, and with my assistant I could suddenly have somebody else help me with the boring tasks.

“At Yellow Cock I met interesting people…”

Within just a few months I have changed strategy from being a sideline business, to give me useful experience for my first “real job” to a new strategy where I want to establish a brand in my own name, with a team of assistants and other interesting people to help me produce the photos, articles, books, websites and other projects I’m involved with.

“I want to defy laws of logic…”

I want to defy laws of logic, e.g. by being able to be two places at the same time (with my assistants as my representatives). I already have a personal publicist in Copenhagen, to represent me in relation to potential galleries for my upcomming photo exhibition. I also want to defy the standard rules for business and employment, e.g. by completely ignoring any financial crisis and growing 300% in staff within half a year.

Yesterday I celebrated this new development with friends and clients.

I’m a big fan of public transportation, especially trains. Thus, the implementation of the new IC4 trains in Denmark is of special interest to me. I live right next to the train service centre in Århus, so for the past four years I’ve seen the new trains parked literally next to my house. The new.. trains are gorgeous from the outside. Long and elegant with pointed noses, these trains signal speed and efficiency. Today I had my first ride with one of them.

Unfortunately the interior doesn’t live up to my expectations. The new IC4 seems noisier, the seats are not as good for sleeping since you can’t rest your head to the side, the interior looks like cheap plastic and the speaker system has a hissing sound. And worst of all: the brilliant flip-tables in the silent zones of the IC3 have been replaced with tables that make it uncomfortable to use even an ultraportable laptop. The only improvement I found was that the sensor-automated doors are more responsive.

Conclusion: for me, as a frequent traveller between Århus and Copenhagen, the upgrade form IC3 to IC4 is insignificant. However, the old IC3′s will replace several pre-IC3 trains on reginoal lines and here the upgrade will be almost overwhelming.

In the late 1980s “What You See Is What You Get” (WYSIWYG) editors streamlined text production. You could now write, edit and layout your text in one tool.

But streamlining is not always the best solution. I’ve found that the mix of writing, editing and layouting text, e.g. in Word, can be incredibly distracting. The automatic spell checker with the curly red underlines interupts my writing. I feel I need to go back and correct my mistake. Annoying and counterproductive – at least for creative writing. However, I never really thought about all this before someone showed me a little program called WriteMonkey (mac-people: check out WriteRoom). With an incredibly minimalist interface, the program has pretty much nothing to disturb your concentration.

I’ve now been using the program for more than a month and I’m falling in love. It’s not the perfect solution for everything, since it adds an extra element to the process. After writing I always need to use a different program for spell check and layout. For e-mails I still prefer Outlook/Word. But for everything where I need to focus and concentrate on the writing itself, I find the tool to be brilliant. Give it a try and see for yourself.

At first I found Twitter to be way too invading in terms of privacy. Why would I want everyone to know what I’m doing right now? I already find the Facebook status-updates to be slightly over sharing – why would I need a new system?

It took me about a year since I first hear about Twitter in Denmark, until I realized what makes it sufficiently different from other social networks to provide value for me and my projects. Let’s first examine a few of the other networks. On LinkedIn you have ‘contacts’ e.g. people you do business with. On Facebook you have friends. In both case we’re dealing with a mutual realtionship based on the fact that you know each other in real life. On Twitter the relationship can be assymmetric. You can follow or be followed, however you only chose whom to follow. Of course, a lot of people simply follow their offline friends as they do on Facebook, but you can also search for, find and follow people with whom you have a shared interest. To keep things straight I have created a Twitter profile for each of my projects relating to a specific area of interest. Thus you can follow my more personal ‘general’ life @mathiasnyc, but you can also follow my master thesis @airportnyc, my fashion book @myfashionbook and GadeMode @gademode.

You can browse the categories using the spinning sphere above.

We all know and love Wikipedia for its great content. Always there to assist you with relevant info about everything from nuclear weapon design to the life of James Joyce. Now there is even a wiki-page about me.

As of today, it is still “flagged” because it doesn’t have any categories, and Wikipedia rules doesn’t allow me to edit it myself, since autobiographies are often strongly biased. However, since it is a wiki everyone can contribute and edit it, so if you have a few minutes you can help Wikipedia (and me) by improving the article. You can add more references to relevant sources or improve the language to make it more neutral and objective.

A danish translation would also seem appropriate :-) Thank you so much!

See the Wiki-page about me

Every now and then I’m invited to give inspirational speeches about my life and my work. Recently I was invited to give a very short eight minute presentation at IT Forum Update 09 – read more about that speech here.

I’m always incredibly nervous when I give speeches. Not that I’m afraid that it will go wrong or just be bad – I’ve seen a fair share of incredibly boring speakers so I know I’m far from hitting the bottom. But I still want to do better. I want to be present in the room. I want to look people in the eyes. I want to deliver my points with precision and accuracy. And I want to be able to stick to my time window. If I have eight minutes I want to make sure that I use the time available without risking to miss the conclusion. As my ole Heuer stop watch clearly shows, I succeeded at least in terms of keeping in time. 7 minutes and 54 seconds – click! “Thank you for listening!”

On Thursday May 28th I gave a short eight minute talk at IT Forum Midtjylland Update 09. Proclaiming that I would save the it business by leading a new path of innovation powered by fun, joy and happines I compared myself to Moses, Jesus and Steve Jobs.

My intention was to keep it loose and entertaining while simultaneously trying to bring in a few truths about how I feel about the it business and the people who work in the it business. My starting point was the lack of innovation. Why, for instance, is it that you can’t have / or \ in filenames? If the it businesses want to be innovative they must learn to think in new ways, and I offered my humble help as the next savior.

Download my presentation here (danish)

Whenever you travel by plane you always go through a series of elaborate security checks in the airport. But what is at stake here? Why do you need to take of your shoes and hand over your water bottle? And does it actually make you safe?

Next fall I’ll be writing my Master Thesis. I have decided to write about airport security technologies since it is both a personal interest of mine and a fascinating interplay between humans and technology. The questions above make me curious, although they are not my primary concern here. What I’m interested in analyzing is what you as a traveller feel. How do you feel when you have to take of your shoes? How do you feel when someone else is being searched? And does it make you feel more safe when you travel?

Through interviews with travellers I’ll be examining this topic from the travellers’s point of view. I will also be examining the public discourse in the media and press: what types of articles are published on this? Finally, I’ll also conducting field observations of travllers in actual airports in order to triangulate my findings from the interviews and relate them to a broader group of people.

If you have read any interesting articles on airport security, please contact me!

The last two times I have visited New York City, I have had the pleasure of staying at 99dolla – the most remarkable bed & breakfast in the city.

In an obscure chinatown location, behind a steel door with a hand painted “41” and after climbing seven flights of stairs, you enter 99dolla. It’s a raw space, with visible pipes in the ceiling and cracked concrete in the bathroom, yet you feel instantly at home. This is partly due to your hosts – Jennifer and Emily. In addition to being increadibly nice, warm and friendly, they are also both increadibly interesting. Jennifer is a sculptural artist and Emily is a writer and project manager. They share a passion for good food and coffee and are both up to date on restaurants and galleries around town. For the first timers this information is crucial for a good experience. Of course you could just buy yourself a guidebook, but it is not the same as getting personal recommendations. Even for an experienced New York visitor I still learn a lot from those girls.

For a room in New York City, 99 dollars pr. night is pretty afforable, and compared to a standard hotel you get: access to an amazing living room where you can hang out and relax, watch movies on the projector screen, listen to music etc., free breakfast every morning including great coffee, fruit, eggs and juice, you can shower in the coolest shower I have ever seen, and you get to stay in an interesting neighborhood where you probably wouldn’t get to stay otherwise. There are several GREAT bars around the block, and many top restaurants are within walking distance. Furthermore, you are invited to use the kitchen if you want to cook your own meals or jsut brew some more coffee. However, the best thing is that you get to meet Jen and Emily.

But times are changing and maybe it will soon be over. Jennifer is going back to school to develop her artistic talent further, and she will be moving out of the city. Emily is currently looking for a new partner to continue running the place, but if it doesn’t happen, 99 will be a thing of the past. If you are going to visit New York before August, make sure to book a stay there(or be square)! 99dolla.wordpress.com

All those years, I figured I knew what I wanted to do with my life.  I would tell myself I would save the world. Or I would become an entrepreneur. A writer. A teacher. A photographer. But no. After spending this entire weekend in the kitchen; baking, cooking and eating; I need to adjust my original plan.

Seriously, I had no idea, cooking could be this much fun. I am not your average kitchen wonder,  but I am learning and experimenting continuously. Yesterday, I baked a couple of breads. Today, I made my own fresh pasta from scratch,  which accompanied by a wonderful meat sauce, was delicious. As for tonight, I am planning to make osso buco. Tomorrow I’ll be experimenting on more bread and the  always tricky sauce bearnaise.

Maybe this obsession will go away over time. Nevertheless, at the moment, I just want to stop everything I am doing and move into my kitchen permanently.

Today, I gave a presentation at the Århus Teknisk Skole for a class of multimedia designers. I was invited to talk about one of my favourite subjects of all times – me. I began my presentation by explaining that my ultimate goal was to save the planet and everyone on it.

After my speech, one of the students asked me “What would be the  link between your ultimate ideals and your fashion projects?” Somewhat startled, I tried to answer the best I could. Nonetheless,  it is not always that easy to link my actual work to my ideals. In the end, I don’t want to betray my ideals nor do I want to change my work or projects. My answer  therefore was two folded.Firstly, I am still learning. Learning to change the world of fashion or the world of boy scouts. Secondly, given the nature of my projects, I get to speak to a lot of people. Sometimes directly as I did today or at times, indirectly through the media, interviews and articles. Nonetheless, I always try to inspire the people I meet. Therefore, even if I fail in my objectives and do get caught up merely fostering my own business, I might still have inspired 10 others to go out and make a difference. In the end, that would thus bridge the inevitable gap between fashion and ideals.

Yesterday, I wrote, that I am currently teaching a class in web development. All this working and teaching is a lot of fun, but I’ve also realised how hard it is to be out there all day.

It all begins in the morning. The actual waking up process, to the sound of an alarm clock is something I am already not used to. The alarm goes off around 7am,  which for me is about 1½ hours earlier than normal. The penetrating sound of the beeper is absolutely harsher than it is to wake up to the feeling of the sunlight gently filling up your room. So far, the toughest part. Next is, actually getting out of bed. An hour later, in a comfortable seat on the train, I am starting to feel fine. I now can look forward to a fun and challenging day.

Now, after my work-day is over, I sit down and contemplate. Overall, it was great. However, I do realize now, that a day of real work, an actual full day of stand-up comedy/teaching,  is really exhausting. When, I got home, I just wanted to lie down on the couch (which I don’t have – but the bed will do), sip a beer whilst reading the paper. For me, anything creative or remotely challenging seemed impossible.

This was an important realization for me. When my rather arrogant ego is annoyed with some other person’s lack of creative enthusiasm, I will now remind myself that it’s not because he or she can’t be creative, it is probably just because he works too much to have any energy left.

This week, I will be teaching a class in web development at a school in Randers. It is an international group of Hospitality and Tourism Management students. Many of them aim for a job in the tourism industry. Of course they do not need to be overly skilled web-developers. Nonetheless, it can be helpful, to learn some basic skills related to working with websites; both technically and conceptually. And that is where I come in.

Contrary to some photographers, I love to shoot personal portraits. I like to experience how others perceive themselves and to try to capture this in a photo.

First, I sit down and talk to people. Or actually, I listen. I listen to their story. I ask them to show me photos of themselves where they look stupid and they tell me why it is they feel they look stupid. Is it a mere silly grin? Flappy ears, beaky noses? I ask them to show me photos of them, where they look good, and to tell me why they look good. Is it the way their nose looks? Is it the look in their eyes?

After this meeting, I try to figure out a way to shoot the photo. Together we find a suitable location. The whole process takes about two hours, and since this is a job I really enjoy, I don’t charge excessive amounts of dollars. If you’re interested in having your portrait taken please feel free to contact me.

As a reference, I have created a page with my favourite portraits.

For the past year or so, I’ve been considering the idea of hiring someone to help me to get organised and focus on administrative tasks. This, in order to let me concentrate on what I do best. Yet, I never dared to actually go the distance. However, back in 2006, I realized the value of an accountant.  In October 2008 me and my friend and co-owner of GadeMode(tm) Helle decided to hire an assistant to run our blog and manage its day to day activities. It took us only about a week to find Mette and she is now doing a great job running the blog. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: hiring Mette has been one of my best decisions in a long time.

Naturally, this led me back to my original idea of having a personal assistant. I started to consider all my tasks. Would this task be something that an assistant could do? How can I make enough money to pay someone else? How do you even hire someone? And isn’t it a bit pretentious to have a PA when you’re 23? One night I just decided to give it a shot. I wrote up a job description and posted it on my website, Facebook and MSN Messenger and within two weeks I had five serious applications in my mailbox.

I’m flattered that so many people even wanted the job. Especially since they were all extremely competent and motivated. None of the applications indicated that this was considere a job to pay the rent.

While the young and beautiful girls had been browsing their grandmothers’ closets with lots of brown and earthy tones, white tuxedo shirts and pleated pants, the boys looked like they came out of London’s Saville Row, with sharply cut striped and checkered suits, bowties and vests.

The models’ street smart attitude provided a nice contrast to these classic looks.The recession might not be the right time to re-launch the ’80s yuppie look with combed-back hair and pseudo-intellectual glasses, but Bertoni managed to add wit by equipping one of the models with a poor man’s fingerless knitted gloves, and it was refreshing to see corduroy back on the runway again.

Download spread from the paper (pdf)

]]> http://www.mathiasvestergaard.com/archives/themes/fashion/anglomania/feed 0 http://www.mathiasvestergaard.com/archives/portfolio/writings/show-review-sexy-hausfrau http://www.mathiasvestergaard.com/archives/portfolio/writings/show-review-sexy-hausfrau#comments Sun, 08 Feb 2009 14:33:51 +0000 mathias http://www.mathiasvestergaard.com/?p=1178

In an intimate space at LitteraturHaus in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro district, Malene Marron presented her simple collection with a laid-back show. An almost ballet-like dance signaled clothes made for an active everyday life, and added variation to the show. On the girls, a series of light, silky nightgowns cut low on the back kept you wondering if the naturally beautiful models were wearing anything underneath, while hausfraus will enjoy the collection’s relaxed and cozy cardigans. For the boys, an overall punky cool look with asymmetric cuts, oversized collars and aggressively pleated pants made for a practical and active urban look. While not breaking any new ground, many of the items will find their way into wardrobes of minimalism-loving Scandinavian boys and girls.

Spread from Dansk Daily (pdf)

Copenhagen Unfair is a small, alternative fashion fair and yesterday five young designers showed their collections in one show. Unfair is located in Copenhagen’s raw, trashy meatpacking district, Kødbyen. The models’ faces were painted with scary grins, creating an extremely dark mood reminiscent of Heath Ledger’s Joker character in Christopher Nolan’s latest batman movie. The brand Asfalt showed happy harlequin colors in stark contrast to the styling, and Tolsing showcased the stewardess from hell and some really cool drop-crotch pants for girls. Screwed put out a look of baseballpreppy hip-hop, Art For The Common Man presented t-shirts and sweatshirts with artsy prints, and finally, Veronica Vallenes, whose collection seemed to be the most coherent and well defined, gave us a fresh take on tailored jackets for women, with loose fits and pantsuits as the dominating element. Creating an engaging show with five young and different designers is truly an impossible task; however, there was a number of really cool items, and having an alternative scene for the very small designers is indeed important. The lack of attention given to this event was what made it unfair.

Spread from Dansk Daily (pdf)

While AnnHagen has been all about bondage, dark rock, goth and deconstruction, mr. Simonsen is associated with luxury and couture.
A slightly deconstructed blue cocktail dress and the bondage belts and straps on the back of some nicely tailored men’s coats and leather jackets, provided a link to Annhagen as we know it. Moving on from this heritage, Simonsen had added padding on hips and shoulders, sculpting the collection’s simple black dresses and beautiful doublebreasted female office suits. Everything was beautifully cut, tailored and fitted, and although some pieces seemed a bit off, the overall impression was a new statement of beauty and elegance, cemented by a short, sexy tube dress with asymmetrical patches of fur, and a range of long evening dresses. This might not please fans of the original, moodier AnnHagen style, but for someone dressing celebrities for the red carpet, this collection had everything. If only Danish celebrities would dare to go there.

Spread from Dansk Daily (pdf)

Cheap Monday brought the recession out in the open by opening their show yesterday with models wearing bags, hats, ties and even guitars made out of cardboard. A refreshing and humorous take on the much-debated financial crisis. The recession feel was underlined with trashed and torn jeans that looked as if they had just been repaired with pieces of gaffer tape. The color chart was in dark, rusty hues and oily blues – a suitable and safe choice for the A/W season. Boyfriend fitted blazers and oversized cape coats teamed up with tight, cropped jeans was for the girls. The boys’ look was loose and antifit with big coats, knitwear and chinos. Although one could have hoped for a little more renewal, Cheap Monday still faced the facts of the crisis and presented a recession concept with jest and humor.

Spread from Dansk Daily (pdf)

Much like entering the Rick Owens store in TriBeCa, N.Y., the guests at jean//phillip’s exclusive show were greeted with the deep rhythms of warm and glitchy minimal techno, setting the mood for a no-nonsense show. While continuing his established aesthetics and sticking to some of his signature looks, designer Jean Phillip delivered an incredibly sharp and balanced collection. Combining shiny patent leather shoes and heavier boots with bondage belts and transparent tops, the overall look was both dark and dandy. Boys will have to show some courage to wear jean//phillip’s rather bold pieces on the street. The masculine corsets – a repeated item in the show — could easily be layered with a sharp white shirt under a tight fitting jacket, however, as a unique vest alternative.
With an extremely sharp vision, a showroom examination will reveal if the production quality has matured and lives up to the designer’s obviously high goals. However, there is no doubt that this is a strong collection.

Spread from Dansk Daily (pdf)

The scene was set for a bash on Thursday night when Soulland presented its new show ‘Savage Mountain’. Located in the raw and industrial Carlsberg Brewery buildings, and with a mountain placed in the center of the catwalk, expectations almost peaked before the show. The first outfit had a cozy look in nude colors, with chinos teamed up with a knitted cardigan. This classic grandpa look was contrasted by the models’ scull painted faces, which left an ambivalent impression of coziness and horror. Basic and wearable items like knitwear, shirts and waistcoats in both bright and pale colors dominated the look. More experimental pieces like knitted pants and a jumpsuit in green gave this increasingly popular streetwear label some extra edge and grit. The overall impression didn’t move mountains, but Soulland still presented a good and varied show with a solid and wearable interpretation of the grandpa look.

Spread from Dansk Daily (pdf)

Accompanied first by feminine jewelry-box music, the models marched out one-by-one wearing nude make up.

Soon enough, though, the peaceful atmosphere was cut off abruptly by loud dupstep, filling the overcrowded room with dark sounds from London’s underground. The stage was set for a dark, postapocalyptic
mood that emanated death, decadence and sex. Complementing the predominance of black were a range of grays and whites. Especially, the limited color palette drew attention to the silhouettes of Vilsbøl’s sculptural, often asymmetrical pieces. The models’ look, not significantly different from the last collection, was constructed around tightly fitted dresses paired with big, padded shoulders, exhaling powerful feminine sexuality. Especially interesting, were the knitted and braided shoulder cushions, a refreshingly 21st century take on this signature ’80s look. Another focal point for both girls and boys was a rich use of mixed materials like leather, knitwear, suede and shiny fabrics, which kept the mood of the show in accordance with the season. For the boys, the grunge look with drop crotch pants, heavy knits and generally loose fits mixed in well with the overall dark and dramatic mood of the show. Most remarkable however was Vilsbøl de Arce’s ability to show a coherent collection with edge and expression, whilst keeping it wearable.

Read the full paper. Review is on page 29.

New York – probably the city with the highest concentration of luxury flagship stores in the world. You can shop in Ralph Lauren’s country club-setting on the Upper West Side or experience genuine British elegance at the Midtown Burberry flagship store.

Recently, designers and architects have been taking such concept stores to a new level. The SoHo Prada store, is such an example. Its spacious set-up combined with its bright lighting  and the affectionate attention given to detail make your shopping experience unique.

Now, Danish fashion brands are catching up with this emerging trend, with new concept stores popping up all over Copenhagen each month.

“You need to constantly renew yourself – a flagship store rarely exists more than 4-5 years.”

Read the article on pages 14-15

Copenhagen Fashion Week A/W09,  has arrived.  As for yours truly, I somehow ended up at the Dansk Daily office on Højbro Plads.

During the next five days, I will be writing show reviews and shooting street style photos. The reviews will be available at www.danskdaily.dk and the photos will be published in the Politiken newspaper on Sunday. I have no idea how this circus will unfold, but what I do know is that I am very much looking forward to it.

After visiting the photo exhibition of Jens Peter Engedal (“Yes We Can”, January 2009) I felt really inspired by his photo exhibition format. The exhibition was based on one single idea, which was thoroughly executed and consequently presented as his  personal statement.

I wanted in on this. Not only, did I like the end-result but the integral process of shooting, selecting and editing photos appealed to me as well. I just needed an idea. That in the end was easier than it seemed. Just before I reached my front door, I noticed it, patina or things that have aged.  That and dirt. Things can only appear to be clean in one way, but they can be dirty in so many interesting ways. This process, which I would label  “aesthetics of dirt” or “aesthetics of age” has appealed to me for quite some time now. I would for instance find it all over New York City but in Denmark it seems harder to come accross. In Denmark, we like things to be white, clean and preferably untouched.

Twelve months have passed and the show is now finally ready. The photos will be shown at
Hatch & Bloom Gallery
Vesterbro Torv 1-3, 3rd floor
8000 Århus C
From February 26th to March 26th.

You can see all the photos at www.mathiasvestergaard.com/signs

I have decided to hire a part-time assistant to help me run my projects. I have no idea whether it will help me or whether it will just be more work. Since, I figured, even the best assistant will still need to learn something about my projects.

Another decisive factor would be the reward in terms of money. Will I end up spending all the money I make on my assistant instead, thus eliminating my own profit? Actually, this is not that much of an objection, since I rarely work for the money anyway. What I think is the ultimate question in this case is: will work be more fun if I have someone to share it with? And in this case I’m fairly certain the answer would be yes. Nevertheless, it won’t be just good old fun to be my assistant. A lot of it, however is. And anyone who would assist me would become part of this.

If you know someone who you think would be just right for the job, please forward the job description below to them.

Deadline for applications is set to February 1st when I return from my upcoming skiing holiday. Interviews will take place in mid-February.

This job is no longer available.

I just love skiing. In just a week from now, I’ll be racing down the snowy slopes in Les Deux Alpes. The past few weeks, I have been training like a maniac to be ready.

My training programme could best be described as follows. Firstly, I have been swimming once a week and running twice a week, usually between 5,5 and 11 km (3,5 and 7 miles). All this in order to harden myself. Secondly, I have even conducted a series of rigorous jumping exercises during my runs in order to emulate the movements of telemark skiing, since this style can be substantially more demanding to your legs and knees compared to the more relaxed alpine style.

The photo was taken by my uncle on a trip to Sweden in 2004, and it is still the best and most illustrative photo I have of myself skiing.

Embarrasing ly enough, I actually slightly misunderstood the definition of “social entrepreneurship”, but I guess it wasn’t too much of a problem, since my aim was to inspire people in general and to think about entrepreneurship in a different way. Key to my speech: Redefining and perpetuating what I do.

Besides this rather uneasy start, my presentation evolved around the theme of finding “energy” , energy that makes you do something . Therefore I did not focus on: writing business plans, doing spreadsheets and drafting budgets. I rather explained how I started as a self-employed web developer at the age of 15 without any master plan,  it just happened. I also told the more elaborate story of how I met Helle (my business partner) in 2005, how we began writing articles for the student magazine Delfinen and how we ended up founding gademode.dk – one of the most popular street style blogs in Denmark.

To me, entrepreneurship is not just about success. I do a lot of projects that fail. Some project-proposals actually never see the light of day. Furthermore,  focussed on a project on online sales and how I wanted to play a little political prank. The talk evolved into a roundtable discussion and altogether it was a really interesting event that I can highly recommend.

You can download my slideshow from the event here (slides and notes are in english).

Check out upcomming Eship-events here.

Actually, it is not so much the fact that I want to be like everyone else, I do want to stand out in a way. I would like to end up in the position, where neither myself or anybody else perceives me as a tourist or visitor.

It is kind of silly and I gladly admit that but I just want to emphasize that the most important focal point is not convincing others, but convincing myself. It all works inward (as a tribute to my at times introvert nature). Anyway, if you want to blend in too, here are six tips that you might find useful.

One: knowing the right places gives you so much credit. It is almost unbelievable, how much respect you can gain with this. Of course, not everyone will respond to this, but if someone asks you which places you want to go to, then you should know just a few of the places that are interesting. If you can just memorize this list, you should be well ahead of the competition: La Esquina (you love the tacos and the atmosphere downstairs), Freeman’s, Marlowe & Sons (in Brooklyn – very exotic, I know), Barrio Chino (their spicy margarita is fabulous), Frankie’s 17 (not as well known, but just insist that it is good) and the Beatrice Inn. Maybe even Prune (really good brunch). Having actually gone there is the next step… Of course there are plenty of other great places too, but those places seem to be well known and highly respected.

Two: learn the language. New Yorkers talk fairly fast and the say “fuck” all the fucking time. It’s like a fucking curse that fucking fucks with their fucking minds (hence the exaggeration). Just replicate – it is pretty fucking easy, right?

Three: memorize the map and have a backup on your phone. The more you are familiar with both the basic anatomy of the city and the actual street names, the more easily you can get around, without always looking at your maps. A little tip, when leaving the subway: always look on the sign above the exit, e.g. “EXIT Essex & Delancey NE corner”. When you reach street level, look for the crossroads – if you are at the north east corner looking at the intersection you’ll be facing south west…

Four: dress normal. Just because the 1986 edition of the guide book you’ve borrowed from your parents states that “New Yorker are always walking around in their white sneakers” , things have changed since. You don’t have to paint your face white and wear black layered clothing – not all  New Yorkers are considere fashionable. On the other hand: there is no harm in making a little effort.

Five: use public transport. Yes, you could walk from 8th avenue and 23rd street to Washington Square, but why not take the C or E train that takes you 90% of the distance?

Six: Tip as Rockefeller. Just do it. If you can’t afford a 20-25% tip at an expensive restaurant, just find a cheaper place to eat. You can get a burrito in the street for $5…

The above guidelines are not meant as an attack on your average tourist. I have no problem with the fact that some people actually want to spend their time visiting the Statue of Liberty. It must make sense to them and I respect that – it is a cultural symbol. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’d rather just live here and relax and for me it makes great sense to get under the skin and know it. The decision is yours!

I know what I want to do. I want to write a book, move to New York, drink cocktails, hang out with friends, etc. Today I discovered a new activity that I really enjoy: running errands.

After two days, working as a volunteer for The Moth (theMoth.org), running around Manhattan picking up various packages for their benefit auction, It  suddenly hit me; I actually enjoy this. The concept of bein a professional, presentable, polite and very patient errand boy feels great. Furthermore, I think it is an important job. You are representing an organization in the first degree, so acting nice and being friendly, without getting smug, is mandatory.

I’ve tried explaining this new idea to people and I think a lot of people don’t’ really get it. They seem to interpret it as a sarcastic remark,  this whilst I am in fact completely sincere. I really love going around town with public transportation, I really love those moments of waiting and I love it when people appreciate what I do. This of course feels very satisfactory, despite the fact I was, in the end,  a frowned upon errand boy.

One guy I talked to, however, really seemed to understand the idea and actually helped me understand myself even better. He told me that he liked my attitude. I hadn’t thought about it this way before, but I think he really hit the spot there. For me it’s not so much about what I do. Being an errand-boy is not what matters. What matters is the attitude I have,  whatever task I take upon myself. That and being humble and appreciative of my life as it is.

On the street style website www.gademode.dk there has recently been a debate about censoring negative comments. Some contributors found us too strict, in the way that we censor too much. I joined the debate in order to add my perspective, and suddenly someone also commented on my book-project, even though this was not really part of the discussion. My friend Helle later told me that she had found it uncomfortable on my behalf that someone knew about this project and pulled it into the discussion. This situation made me think about a recurrent theme in my life (and in the lives of many others) namely the distinction between public and private life. The development of personal websites in the 90′s and through MySpace and Facebook now, has created a platform where everyone can publish parts of their private life, thus making their lives public property. I don’t want to sound technophobic – this is not about avoiding Facebook or never sharing anything online. I personally share a lot of myself online. What I would like to argue is simply that the difference between what is private and what is made public reflects a choice, instead of merely replicating what others do.

For me, almost everything in my professional life is publicly available in some form. I write articles, give speeches and tell everyone what I do. Some projects fail miserably, and this is no secret. Furthermore, my contact info is also readily available. If you for instance, find me on Facebook, you can have at least some insight about my friends and who they are.

So where is the limit? If you browse my Facebook or website pages you won’t be able to see much about my family. You might notice that it says “in a relationship” and maybe you could track the person down in some way or the other. But the point is: you won’t find photos from our romantic trip to Moscow. You won’t even know if we actually went to Moscow. But why not show your love online? Why should it be secret? For me, there is no perfectly rational reason for this, although I would argue two points here. First,  if I would pull my family and girlfriend into my public life, I don’t leave them a choice. What if they don’t want to be public property? Secondly and finally, my relationship with my girlfriend and family is not improved by public display (in contrast to my professional life, where my projects often need the attention of others).

So, I have a lot of wishes for my birthday on November 27th and again for Father Christmas. Here is an extensive list, including books, kitchen ware, fashion items and the quintessential hard liqour.

Beginning from the top of the matrix ( referring to the more academic/intellectual) there are a few books I would like to have in my shelf, e.g. Bruno Latour’s Science In Action, Rune Lykkeberg’s Kampen om Sandhederne and maybe even Dick Hebdige’s Hiding In The Light.

Shifting to the left side of the matrix (the practical stuff), I could really use a plain, simple and old bike. Ideally without much maintenance and worth too little for anyone to steal. Furthermore, a little table and a chair for my balcony would be great. Also, a sharpening steel for my kitchen knives and the incredibly masculine and beautiful sauting pan from Alessi would make cooking more fun. In addition to this, the Kaj Boyesen desert forks, would look great on the table.

Shifting gradually to the more aesthetically oriented stuff (fashion), I am on the lookout for a great leather bag. Larger the a briefcase but smaller than a weekend bag. Also, a pair of really cool black leather gloves and a raw belt with just a hook (instead of a buckle) would look cool paired with a pair of April 77 Jeans.

Finally, when we move to the more odd department to the right, I love the Sazerac Rye Whiskey and Old Fashioned cocktails with Pychaud’s Bitter. Not to mention a simple black/white stock film for my old Olympus OM-1 (the most beautiful SLR to date).

During my time in high school I wrote a ton of assignments, however, only a select few deserve public access.

These include my “3.g-opgave” (SSO) in mathematics on cryptology, my “historieopgave” on the establishment of the Danish monarchy, and three essays in Danish: one about Martin A. Hansen’s short story ‘paradisæblerne’ (second year), another on the saga of Ravnkel Frøjsgode (second year) and finally a dicussion on how our language is influenced by our heavy use of cell phones and text messaging.

During my first two years on Information Studies I wrote most of my exam papers in collaboration with Lassegruppen. All those papers are described there.

On Cognitive Semiotics, I wrote an exam paper on metaphors and image schemas in human cognition and here is available my BA thesis on cognition, language and fashion.

Yesterday, on Wednesday October 1st, I gave a very short speech at a conference organized by IT Forum Midtjylland. The theme of the conference was “living in a digital world” and the other speakers included the likes of Marc Prensky and Anne Lise Kjaer.

My speech was intended to give a real life example of the theories presented by Prensky and Kjaer, so I talked about my daily life. My addiction to Outlook, my 12″, 3 pound office (a ThinkPad x60s) that I use to get around, how I manage projects for clients in Copenhagen, with developers in Minsk and me sitting around in New York. I talked about how I don’t distinguish between work and play – about meditation and stress (and how leaders often talk about it as something that doesn’t exist). Finally I talked about my projects and how I manage my digital online identity.  Before I knew it, my 8 mins were up and it was time for a coffee break.

You can download my presentation (including my notes) here.

In my life, projects, ideas and meetings take up a good part of my time. This is what makes my life challenging and interesting.  However, the lack of any overall schedule and the fact that almost every day I have to reinvent my life, is also what makes it rather stressful at times.

Giving a speech or a presentation is something I’ve tried several times before, however, when you suddenly have 250 listeners instead of just 30 or 40, it proved to be just a bit more stressful than it usually is.

Due to incidents like this and due to my general aim to nourrish my inner balance and harmony, I decided to take a course in meditation.  The eight weekly training sessions with lots of homework between classes are now over – so how was it?

It was definitely worth it. What I needed was a extended set of tools that I could use to manage my feelings, frustrations, overwhelming thoughts, stress etcetera. What I dicoverer? I learned simple techniques to feel my breathing and body, in order to be present in the moment.  In addition to this, I also learned more challenging techniques to sort through my thoughts.

Henceforth, the whole process of learning meditation has been like an exciting journey into myself. I’m definitely not done with it. There will be many situations in the future where I can use what I’ve learned.

Today Helle and I gave a short presentation about our website GadeMode and talked about entrepreneurship at the Varde Handelskole og Handelsgymnasium. We told the story about how we started GadeMode.dk and how the project has developed up until today . Our aim was to show that everyone can do a project like this and henceforth, we encouraged the students to start their own projects.

Ifyou have a popular blog, and someone offers you a huge amount of money to write about a product they offer, as if it was something you had stumbled upon by yourself, would you do it?

On Gademode.dk we were recently approached by Carat – the biggest media bureau in Denmark. They wanted to do a collaboration with us, becoming part of a new campaign for Bianco Footwear (Bianco.com). They asked us to come up with an idea. We discussed their proposal and agreed that we were interested in a collaboration. Nevertheless, we didn’t feel comfortable to do anything that did not feel sincere. Therefore we developed a personal working concept.

This is not about being idealistic and naive

This is not about being idealistic and naive. Of course it’s nice to earn money through blogging. If one however compromises the authenticity of your blog, you might lose some  of your followers and readers. Therefore our credo: Keeping it authentic, for us is a long term business strategy.

Keeping it authentic is thus simply a long term business strategy

Therefore, our idea was a three-way-deal: Bianco would pay us to create a series of articles on our site – ‘premium content’ that we wouldn’t normally have the time to write. Bianco has no influence on the actual content, except that we agreed that it should be about shoes in general. Since Bianco pays for it, we can give it out to our users for free. In this way, it not just us, benefitting economically from advertisement and Bianco benefitting from exposure on our site, our users also get something they otherwise wouldn’t get.

During Scout Festival 2008, I tried hard to catch the attention of the daily press. I felt (and I still feel) that Scout Festival has some really interesting elements that were worth writing about. First of all, we made history by building the first newbuilt mosque in Denmark.

All existing mosques are old factory buildings with a carpet. Secondly, the festival was a physical manifestation of all the more flimsy words we talk about every day: innovation, creativity, freedom etcetera. It was all there – right in front of you. According to the Danish prime minister, Denmark is supposed to be a leader in innovation. Whenever government officials, however talk about innovation it seems that they have no real clue what it actually is or how it looks in real life.

But no matter what I did or said, it was of no real interest to the journalists, so I ended up writing a letter to the editor instead. In my letter, I formalized my complaint that the press was ignorant towards really important matters.

It was printed on Friday August 8th 2008, and can be found online, or you can download my original script here. (Danish only)

In addition to being an album by Jesus And The Mary Chain, Darklands is also a brand new fashion store in Berlin, Germany.

It features some of the most exclusive high-end men’s fashion brands, including Carol Christian Poell, Julius, Damir Doma, MA+, The Viridi-anne, Boris Bidjan Saberi, Undercover, Lumen et Umbra, Kosmetique Label, Augusta, Goti and Diet Butcher Slim Skin. The website is build on WordPress, with a simple custom theme based on the mono-space logo-type and huge, functional fonts. The only visual effect is the subtle fabric-like background, adding a material/industrial feel to the website.

In addition to, a showcase of the physical store, the website also displays an online catalogue. If you find something you like, just write them an e-mail and they will help you find your right size and ship it right off to your doorstep.

Visit the site at www.darklandsberlin.com

Danish fashion brands such as; Designers Remix Collection, Wood Wood, Dyrberg/Kern, Vondahe are currently launching their own online stores, but such E-business can prove to be rather tricky. The breakthrough of e-business revolutionized the way people buy electronic equipment, and e-business has made competition increasingly fixed on prices.

Through the optimization of supply chains and massive advantages of scale (larger clientele), online retail practices are dominated by the Goliaths. According to, industry insiders profit margins can be as low as 10% in consumer electronics, effectively driving out small competitors. Compared to electronic equipment, fashion products are much less standardized and implementing a successful and matching e-commerce strategy is indeed a challenging task.

This article was cowritten with Helle Rohde Andersen, and published in Dansk Daily on Saturday 09.08.08. Read the full article in Dansk Daily Online, or download pdf.

The Danish jewellery industry as we know it today can be traced back to the early 19^th century. Around 1904, when silversmith and sculptor Georg Jensen started his workshop in Copenhagen in, he was initially inspired by organic shapes and insects.

Within a few years, his work was highly demanded by wealthy citizens and aristocrats throughout the world. The genuine craftsmanship combined with precious materials and his signature Scandinavian design has been the cornerstone of Georg Jensen’s jewellery through the years. Since the establishment of Georg Jensen the gold- and silversmith profession has developed radically. Today, new companies are shaping the field turning the noble craftsman profession into a growing and successful fashion industry.

This article was cowritten with Helle Rohde Andersen, and published in Dansk Daily on Friday 08.08.08. Read the full article in Dansk Daily Online, or download pdf.

In August 2008 , a special group of the YMCA Scouts in Denmark organized a brand new type of event. The combination of the best elements of scout camp with music/party marked the creation of Scout Festival. With some additional innovation and creativity, the Scout Festival became a complete unique experience for all participants.

I was lucky enough to be part of the planning-commission for this magnificent event. This naturally, made it even more thrilling to see how well it was received by all participating teenagers. Next to, the selection of the bands we wanted to perform, I was also in charge of a modelling-workshop. However, my biggest task was running the 24/7 movie theater. I had made a rather ambitious selection of new and old movies, which meant following a strict schedule.

Within the next year, I plan to write more about this festival, since it was such a great interactive experience.

An integral part of my life involves project work. I love to be involved in all kinds of projects – especially when the project involves interesting people.

In this section of my website, I will write about my thoughts on various projects. The main focus here, is the process rather than the result. If you are more interested in the end-result, please refer to my portfolio.

My most recent and most interesting projects include a festival for teenagers, the marketing process of folding doors, a website on street fashion, a book on fashion theory and the creation of a new short movie.

I currently have profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Kommunikationsforum (DK), YouTube, Flickr, MitKBH (DK), Mangospot (DK), Yelp and Cargo Collective.

LinkedIn is my preferred business contact network. It is less fuzzy and more sober, compared to MySpace and Facebook. Furthermore, LinkedIn enables me to stay in touch with my clients and acquintances that I don’t see regularly. Henceforth, it also allows me to recommend my business partners, which I think is a nice subtle gesture. I try to keep my LinkedIn resume updated, however, it is a bit limited when it comes to project work. My most recent resume can be found here. Visit my LinkedIn-profile

Although I have a MySpace-profile, I rarely use it. Visit my MySpace.

Kommunikationsforum is a Danish community for freelance writers and people who work with communication.

YouTube allows me to upload my own movies. I love short and simple movies.

Flickr is a great tool for publishing photos online, however, I use it mostly as an extra backup and most of my photos are hidden.

Finally, MitKBH, Mangospot and Yelp.com are all user-driven websites where you can review restaurants, shops and bars. If you use these sites you might eventually come across one of my reviews.

GadeMode(tm) is a photo blog o street style phontography in Denmark, founded by Helle Rohde Andersen and myself. It shows one new picture every day, highlighting the characteristics and features of the outfit. Users of the site can comment on the photos and more generally, discuss fashion and design. It is the most influential street style blog in Denmark, with more than 2.000 unique individual visitors each day.

The site was launched in spring 2007. Helle Rohde Andersen and I had been discussing the project for some months and although we were a bit sceptic; we decided to do it. We were inspired by international street style blogs, mainly by the notorious blog The Sartorialist run by Scott Schumann. Originally we wanted to name the site “Sartorialist Denmark” to honor his site. However, we later decided that we wanted to keep the site in Danish with a Danish name. We ended up calling it GadeModeÅrhus which is merely a contraction of the Danish term for street style and the name of the city we live in. Actually, the seed had been planted more than a year before, when Helle Rohde Andersen and I started writing articles about fashion in the student magazine Delfinen. You can read about those articles here.

“Most exciting, however, have been the many side effects of running a popular street style blog. “

Since we launched the site the user base has been growing steadily, and since the Fall 2007 ,we started recruiting voluntary photographers to help us capture the life on the street. We also expanded to cover the three major cities in Denmark (Arhus, Copenhagen, Odense).

Most exciting, however, have been the many side effects of running a popular street style blog. Helle and I have been invited to interesting events, offered freelance jobs as writers and photographers, participated in interviews for magazines, print and television and met a lot of interesting  people. So far, it has thus been a very exciting ride and hopefully it is not over yet.

If you live in New York City, you know that there is always something going on somewhere and if you know the right people you will know where to go. However, in a small town like Århus, there is not that much to do and when there is finally is something new and exciting going on, you sometimes risk to miss out on it.

I discussed this problem with Andreas Lemche, who wanted to develop a blog to alleviate this problem. He felt he was pretty well connected and he wanted to share the information he had. We quickly realized that it might be better to go for a collective approach. Andreas thus started recruiting people and I worked on a simple design template for the site.

Eventuelt.org answers one basic question: What can I do in Århus within the next week?

The design is simple. Inspired by an idea of the 1920s New York Times newsdesk, with coffee, cigarettes and deadlines, the site incorporates typewriter-style fonts, narrow newspaper  text columns and a visual marker showing spilled coffee on a piece of paper. The front page shows the four latest entries in a grid layout, providing a very clear overview.

In addition to project coaching and technical assistance I also contributed to the blog with a weekly column on cocktails. Today I’m featured on the blog as a special guest – blogging about my life in general.

I guess I simply enjoy doing things. This could range from: making coffee, to meeting someone or to writing a book. As a person, I write, I teach, I develop websites and webdesign, I help people start up their new projects or even companies, I take photos, attend meetings, study, read books and magazines. Luckily, I have found a way to make a living, doing something I absolutely love.

Not all of my activities make any money, but some of them do, and they provide for my other activities. Therefore, I do not distinguish between work and leisure.

Idealistically, I want to change the world, to make it a better place for everyone! Ambitious?  Well, yes,indeed. How am I going to do this? Well, I am still young, so there is no final plan or direction, so I am trying out different options. The idea of a career in politics is not part of the plan (yet). Instead, I am trying to get myself onto several company boards. This has proven difficult, but I haven’t given up. Whilst, I try to gain access to such influential positions in existing corporations, I also try to set up new projects and new companies. How will this contribute to making our world a better place?

I don’t distinguish between work and leisure.

Basically, my idea is that we have to revolutionize the way we work. In our Western civilized world, most people work too much. This is not necessarily a bad thing, however, I have found that this massive workload has an unintended side effect. After nine hours of hard work it is simply not possible to care much for the environment or people in the third world. I guess it comes down to basic neural behaviour: as our energy level decreases, we rely ever more on the simplest parts of our brains – the parts governing the basic needs for food and rest. Hard work thus becomes an excuse to face larger more pressing global problems. In politics today, one can note such a pattern resulting  in quick- fix short term solutions. Henceforth, the papers are filled with political scandals and effortless back-bench policy making.

If we could change the way we worked, so that we could all work less and have more mental surplus to deal with the world in its majestic sense; I think we would have a much better chance of making a better world.

In order to further enhance my ideas, I also try to inspire people. I write columns, articles and hopefully even will be able to finish a book some day. In this way, I try to present an alternative life style.  A lifestyle, where it is not all about  paychecks or nice cars and fancy restaurants.

My life is about doing what I feel like. I don’t restrict myself to one job or one past-time activity. Personally, I want my virtual online identity to reflect my life style. My identity should be a collection of the diversity of my activities. This encompasses: my cocktail reviews, my website portfolio. my pictures, my random ideas and thoughts and my resume.

This was the purpose when I redesigned this website. However, Facebook actually did it before I was ready to launch. By integrating RSS-feeds, Picasa, Flickr and Yelp, Facebook is effectively making personal websites obsolete.

By integrating RSS-feeds, StumbleUpon, Picasa, Flickr and Yelp, Facebook is effectively making personal websites obsolete

The only real problems with Facebook are: First, that the visitor must also have a Facebook profile to take advantage of the interactional capabilities and Second, you have really no control over privacy when it comes to photos and personal information. The owners of Facebook can pull out all kinds of statistics out of their hats, to analyze mass behaviour. Additionally, it has recently been discussed how difficult it is to actually delete your personal information or your profile on Facebook. Facebook does not guarantee that your data are actually deleted, even though it is no longer publicly available.

My personal (and only partial) solution to the second problem, is to inject just a minor portion of false or misleading information into the system. This will decrease the value of my personal information since it can no longer be perceived as an omnipresent truth.

Visit my Facebook profile here.

KingsArmsNet is a new and exclusive network for twenty business leaders from Denmark. They met during a leadership training program and decided to stay in touch so they could exchange valuable insights and experiences. Since it is difficult to have collegues when you ate actually in charge, KingsArmsNet also functions as a social group.

After the network had been formed, Charlotte Svendstrup Paaskesen came to me and asked me about how they could establish an affordable website and communications platform.

Through the usage of open source software from WordPress.org and a modified design template, I was able to set up a simple site on a very low budget. Consequently, I hired an assistant to help me migrate all their existing data (photos, documents etc.).

Unfortunately, the website is closed to the public.

The personal website has evolved from a standard business card to an online portfolio. Some switched to blogs, whilst others moved into the online open spaces of social networks like MySpace and Facebook. My old website had become a Hemmingwayan island, perpetually isolated from the real action and consequently fragmented into numerous sub-sites for various projects.

A Google search for Mathias Vestergaard would reveal an incomprehensible list of seemingly unrelated websites in Danish and English, with no clear starting point.

The idea of this new website is to provide the connection between all my online activities and my physical self. It is meant to integrate my collection of reviews, articles, website projects, social network profiles, past and ongoing projects, photos, movies and more. Also, I have tried to update all my incoming links so they all point to this site, thus creating a starting point for further exploration.

You can follow me on my site, but why not get a personal newsletter as well?

There will be no guarantees regarding the ontent or the frequency of my updates, but if you’re interested, click on the subscribe now button.

One of my recent passions include writing a weekly column about cocktails. It is a voluntary project, but also an excellent reason to get a drink on a plain tuesday afternoon. The column is published almost every week on www.eventuelt.org.

Cocktails – the stronger the better! I generally prefer Martinis and martini-like cocktails, including (but certainly not limited to) Manhattans, Gimlets, (strong) Margaritas. I also love the old classics like the Sazerac.

“The stronger the better!”

In my favorite Martini you find: stirred Plymouth Navy Strength poured in a chilled and Noilly Prat coated cocktail glas garnished with an olive and a lime twist and with just a single drop of Angostura bitters. If the omnipresent Plymouth is not available, I use frozen Tanqueray (just keep it in the freezer where it belongs). The olive, the twist and the vermouth can also be left out, if there is an emergency and no time to fiddle around.

You can find my column at Eventuelt.org (in Danish)

I generally stick to projects with short or very short time frames. I like to see the results quickly and to seek recognition for my accomplishments. However, during a summer holiday in Berlin 2007, I met up with Bill, a friend of mine from London.

He is from Kansas City but wants to live in London and was spending some time in Berlin due to visa problems. I complained about my struggles to get a visa to the US and during our dinner at some fairly random, but supposedly italian restaurant, he suggested I wrote a book. At first, I thought he was kidding, but he was serious and the idea developed in my head. At first I wanted to write about fashion and cognitive semiotics, but it occured to me that it would be better to try to write an introductory text book.

You can follow the development of the book on my website.

This paper outlines Rolands Barthes early semiologic inspired theory of fashion and discusses how this theory can be revised to fit later cognitive theories of language and semiotics.

The theory, departs from the dialectic influence between dress (as a shared system of meaning) and (the act of) dressing.  This paper illustrates the hypothesis that fashion can be seen as an act of communication based on cognitive associations of frames and that fashion language thus is based on schematic image distinctions.

Download (pdf)

I’m currently working on a new movie. In collaboration with my friend and former teacher, Thomas Lind Laursen, I’m working on a script. After two years of discussing the project, we’re still very much stuck in the making process. The script is only gradually taking its shape.

However, what I find interesting about this project, in relation to most of my other projects, is that it is extremely process oriented. Normally, I focus much more on getting some product/result out of my work: an exam paper, a website, a collection of photos. This project however, is about doing what feels right. Also, because it’s a no-budget movie, we have to be very creative throughout the process. If a script is good, but not actually something we can produce, we have to reconsider.

This post will be updated as we’re making progress… if.. that is.

Sabroe, one of the best-known designers, specialist manufacturers and suppliers of high-quality refrigeration equipment in the world, wanted to have a simple memory game on their website.

Through the usages of a random set of images of products and other brand identity material, the game actually communicates the Sabroe concept.

The game utilizes an Adobe Flash element, a simple text file and a set of jpg-images loaded on-the-fly. The game can easily be adjusted and customized. Another version of the memory game was used as part of an e-learning system. Read about Flash games in e-learning here.

Try the game on Sabroe.com

The full title of this article is “From Foucault and filter coffee to Latour, oysters and champagne” and it is my personal account of how I see voluntary work in student organizations and what I find so fascinating about it.

Of course I use the insights, I gathered through my involvement in the Students Association at the department of Information Studies (SAIS). Since 2006, we have transformed the board of SAIS into an exclusive dinner club. This might sound less than serious, but it has been an important move, since the voluntary work is no longer felt as a burden: we always have a good time at meetings. In other words: what we have done, is to provide the participants with something more than just filter coffee and a guilty conscience. Through such enjoyable meetings we create and sustain an energy level that helps us keep the organization running accordingly.

This article was published in the student magazine Kontekst, but had previously been published in Delfinen in a shorter version. Read about it here.
Read the full text(Danish only)

Sprogbogen.dk is a free e-learning center, where you can practice your skills in Danish grammar, spelling etc. The site is a supplement to the book Sprogbogen.

Since 2001, I have been involved with the Netfidus-project, providing afforable online learning to schools around the country. From the outside, the system is relatively simple: chose a type of task, solve it and get your results. What makes it interesting, is the back end system. Through the utilization of both the knowledge and some of the technology from Netfidus we developed a simple task specification syntax and a back-end system that could handle these tasks. The task specification syntax is completely text based, therefore, there is no special design-interface required. To create a simple task where the user has to input the correct ending of a word, you simply type “He was run_ning_”. Here the user must type in ‘ning’ after ‘run’ to get a point. To create a task with a spelling mistake you type “This is spel(l)ed incorrectly”. Here the user will see the sentence “This is speled incorrectly”. To get a point he or she must put in the missing ‘l’ in spelled.

With simple syntax constructions like this, the editors of the site were able to build complex sets of tasks, training special skills.

My role in this project was to design the syntax and handle the practical implementation. Henceforth, I developed a plain demo for myself, however, for the actual coding and implementation, I hired a development company in Belarus, Minsk, which has also handled the latest revisions of the Netfidus platform. This has given me quite a lot of experience with outsourcing. However, I must admit that I’m not that qualified for this part of the project role. The fact that one finds oneself in the middle, between client and the development company can be very frustrating and time consuming.

During the past seven years I’ve been doing quite a lot of projects evolving  around the concept of e-learning. Most recently, I worked with Finanssektorens Uddanelsescenter (the Educational center for financial institutions) creating small games and other activities to give the user a break from the actual learning.

The games are of course customized to match the visual identity of the client’s existing system. The screenshot above is taken from a car racing game. In addition to being action packed, it is also a challenging motoring task, since the steering wheel is controlled by dragging the mouse to the left or right, while the acceleration and brakes are controlled by the keyboard.

In addition to the car game, you can also find a puzzle and memory game. You can read about the memory game here.

Try the game here.

In the April 2008 issue of Delfinen (#140) the theme was “Social Responsibility”. Therefore, I decided to write a short text about voluntary work in student organizations. In the article, I provided my own perception on putting student work in a broader perspective and adviced the reader to try this too.

This article was later re-written and published again in another student magazine called Kontekst. Read about it here.

Read full text (Danish only)

Call me old-fashioned but I prefer e-mail.

E-mail: m@mathiasvestergaard.com
In case of emergencies you can call me. Phone: +45 27102711.

I am also available through:

Facebook
LinkedIn
Twitter

If you have an urgent message, I must stress, a phone call is the most effective way to reach me. For more elaborate inquiries,  please contact me by e-mail.

On March 18th 2007, carpenter Flemming Wulff sent me an e-mail. He had heard about me at a conference for self-employed people, where Anne-Maria Dahl had mentioned me in her speech. In addition to his work as a carpenter, he is running a small production company which develops custom-made folding doors (see image).

At the moment, we are now working together on a strategy to present his high quality folding doors, as a trendy and unique alternative to having no doors at all or to your ordinary normal door.

Here you can check out my first website set-up: http://deluxefoldedor.dk/

This page will be updated as the project develops over time.

In the March 2008 issue of Delfinen (#139) the theme was “Tradition”, so I wrote a brief essay on how to behave correctly. My claim was that Emma Gad (the Danish equivalent to Miss Manners, aka Judith Martin) had been widely misunderstood as a dictator of proper behavior, which is really not the case.

When reading her books on manners you find that her guidelines are always deeply concerned with how we can be nice to each other.  Furthermore, I argued that gentleman behavior had been threatened by the feminist movement, where the act of holding a door for a woman was seen as disrespectful to a woman’s integrity and self-respect.

Read the full text
(Danish only)

During fall 2007 I spent three months in New York City. It was a great experience for me. During my time in Manhattan I wrote several articles about life in the city. While I was there I was contacted by Chris Pedersen, whom at the time was the fashion editor of Euroman.

He asked me to shoot some street style photos from NYC and he wanted to know if I wanted to set up and interview with New York-based menswear designer Thom Browne. In my opinion, Euroman is the best men’s magazine published in Danish and I felt honoured to take up the job. Next to this, I was excited to see if it was even possible to accomplish since I had been a fan of Mr. Browne’s clothing for a long time. I managed to set up time for an interview and subsequent photo shoot. Thom Browne’s PR company handled it all smoothly.

The portrait was eventually published in the March 2008 issue of Euroman. Due to copyright restrictions it is not available online.

The theme of the February 2008 issue of Delfinen (#138) was “Make it new”, so in my last article about New York I focused on some the current trends in NYC. What I found was that many restaurants and bars were practicing a kind of pseudo-secretness.

Pseudo because they were never really secret – you could always look them up in Yelp.com or some other city guide – but they still pretended to be. One of my favourite spots when I was there, was La Esquina. On the corner of Kenmare and Lafayette in SoHo, the place appears to be a take-out joint, but there is a door that will lead you down to the basement where a hidden restaurant and bar is located.

I wonder if we will ever see anything like this in Denmark.

Read full text(Danish only)

Since the publication of ‘Metaphors We Live By’, by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in 1980, the theory of conceptual metaphors and image schemes has received quite a lot of attention. Although the theory has also been subject to severe criticism, the cognitive linguistic tradition has grown into a field of its own.

This paper answers the following questions:

How do image schemas structure our (human) conceptualization of the world? And how does image schemas relate to conceptual metaphors? How can the three metaphorical ex-amples (1) “running for president”, (2) “The deal rescues Countrywide” and (3) “she is a Houston-jumper” be analyzed in terms of conceptual metaphor theory and image schemas?

Download (pdf)

In my second article about New York, I focused on how to get there. How can you get to experience the life in Manhattan if you are from Denmark and do not have a work permit?

I asked two Danish students, who were doing internships at the time.

Martin was interning as an architect and Marianne was at a non-profit organization. It was really interesting to see how they had each managed to find a way to do so. Furthermore, they both explained what they found to be the most interesting aspects of the city.

The article was published in the December 2007 issue of Delfinen (#137)

Read full text(Danish only)

During my fall 2007 stay in New York City I wrote a series of articles about life in the city, compared to my home town Aarhus. The articles were published in the student magazine Delfinen. In this first article in what became a trilogy (published in November 2007, #136) Here, I focus on the street life of the city. I felt inspired by an exhibition on Jane Jacobs, henceforth, I tried to pinpoint what it is that makes life in NYC so special and how we could learn from it in Aarhus, Denmark.

Read full text (Danish only)

The Komakino Guerrilla Store is an amazing men’s store in Vancouver, BC. It moves to a new location every year, following the constant fashion flux. With every move, there appears a new website and for me it was an honour to design this year’s. First, I developed the version 2.0 website, with panoramic images of the physical store. When I was asked, to develop version 4.0, I wanted something more simplistic. At the time, I was completely obsessed with functional typography, especially the Helvetica font. Therefore, I decided to develop the site based on simple geometric shapes, the Helvetica font and the usage of black and white colours.

When you first see the website it is so minimalist that it is almost boring, but if you keep starring at it, you will notice that it is not as it seems. In your peripheral vision the borders are moving (very slowly). Sometimes the box expands, and sometimes it contracts. Combined with another subtle shaky -effect (which corresponds to certain elements of the eerie background music) the website can almost feel uncomfortable.

The store is currently in 7.0, but you can still visit the archived version 4.0 here. You can also read about the earlier version 2.0 here.

Yesterday, I gave a short presentation on “entrepreneurship in a different way”, at In Spe (the entrepreneurial network at Aarhus School of Architecture). Usually, entrepreneurship is all about business plans, budgets and investors. My key point, in this presentation was that (especially as an architect) you can acually just start work. There is really no need to slow yourself down with all that planning.

Through a series of short stories, I further enhanced my key-points and throughout the presentation I tried to remain very concrete, concise and provided practical tips and tricks. One of the most difficult things for new entrepreneurs is setting the right price: how much are you worth? I explained my own price model. If you want to hear more about this, please contact me.

In the September 2007 issue of Delfinen (#134) I wrote this incredibly short power review of the graphic novel adaption of Paul Auster’s City Of Glass.

Read the full text(Danish only)

The idea of designing a website for a writer was a new challenge for me. Thorkild Borup has written several books about famous Danish authors including H. C. Andersen, Benny Andersen, Ludvig Holberg and Tom Kristensen. Therefore, he needed a simple website where the main focus would be on the text/words and he showed me a couple of examples from other websites.

I decided to keep the website sober, using black and white, with only a few highlights in red, and almost no graphic elements, except for a few illustrations. I wanted the lettering to look like a book so I used the Georgia font for the main text. I however still wanted the site to be just a little more dynamic, therefore I chose to incorporate the New Caledonia font in the main headings. The subtle effect to the site can be described as a subtle feel of old paper, implemented by the positioning of a watermark in the upper-left corner.

In order to facilitate the editing-process of the content, I designed a very simple CMS back-end.

This paper discusses the use of digital manipulation in fashion photography and how this is changing our general perception of photos in general.

It was written as an exam paper in the course Digital Æstetik (Digital Aesthetics) at the Department of Information Studies in spring 2007.

Download the paper. (Danish only)

After a short break, Helle Rohde Andersen and I resumed our scribblings about fashion. In our fifth fashion article, published in the May 2007 issue of Delfinen (#133), we provide an account for how fashion affects national economics.

By linking the rising US-inflation in the 70s with the introduction of casual Friday and the burst of the dot-com bubble to men wearing Bermudas and flip-flops to work, the article satirically states that fashion is extremely important for our national economy.

“Most people think that fashion is a superficial phenomenon, which only applies to superficial people. In this article we will prove that fashion influences our everyday life, more than we would think. Additionally, we will show you how bad style choices have caused national and global catastrophes throughout history.”

Read full text (Danish only)

The story is relatively simple, yet it has a certain ambiguity that adds an overall tension to the movie. We did worked most on the pre-production of the movie.

Since we developed a good script and a very detailed storyboard we were able to shoot the movie within just two nights. The rest was done in editing. Effects were added – slow zooming motions – and all images were desaturated. Two years after the original version of the movie was cut, a new and original soundtrack was created for the movie.

Watch the movie on YouTube

Lassegruppen was a study group at the department of Information Studies (at the University of Aarhus), collaborating on exam papers from October 2005 through April 2007.

Exam papers, fourth semester, April 2007

• Digital Æstetik (Janus)
• Digital Æstetik (Lasse)
• Digital Æstetik (Mathias)

Exam papers, third semester, January 2007

• Videnskabsteori (Janus)
• Videnskabsteori (Kasper)
• Videnskabsteori (Lasse)
• Videnskabsteori (Mathias)
• Organisations Analyse(Kasper & Lasse)
• Organisations Analyse(Janus & Mathias)
• Informationsvidenskabelig Metode (summary)

You can still contact us at

lassegruppen@funkypeople.dk

Exam papers, second semester, June 2006

• Kommunikation
• Programmering og systemudvikling

Exam paper, first semester, January 2006

• Teknologihistorie: Novozymes

The members of the group were:

• Janus Novak Olesen
• Kasper Hedegaard Schiølin
• Lasse Knud Damgaard
• Mathias Vestergaard

LidtMereLuksusIHverdagen.dk is a personal shopping guide designed and researched by Pernille Skovbjergs home website . The site also is a clear statement about how websites can be more interesting, inspiring and feminine.

The website was designed around a somewhat weird metaphor, where an animal represents a partical shop or café. When you click on an animal it flips around and transforms into a post it-note.

An animal is also a post it-note.

The site was launched in May 2006 and was later updated in December 2006.

The site principally was an interactive experience. Unfortunately, the website was closed down in November 2008, since Pernille didn’t want to maintain it anymore. 

This paper examines the move from a Cartesian distinction between body and mind to a phenomenological body in-the-world.  Henceforth, it discusses how clothing in many ways became an integral part of our body, since covering the body is the rule, since public nudity is considered unappropriate .

It was written as an exam paper in the course Videnskabsteori/Studium Generale (Philosophy of Science) at the Department of Information Studies in spring 2007.

Download the paper. (Danish only)

This paper describes the movement from Max Webers verstehen sociology, to Bruno Latour’s and John Law’s actor-network theory.

This paper was written in collaboration with Janus Novak Olesen from Lassegruppen.

Download the paper (pdf)

Komakino Guerrilla Store Version 2.0 is a high-end fashion store, built around a nomad-concept: the store moves to a new location every year! Currently it’s located in Vancouver, Canada.

The website shows real photos from the store in a panoramic view, giving the user the option to turn around in the open space, and a possibility to discover all the brands: Number (N)ine, Raf Simons, Rick Owens, Ann Demeulemeester, Costume National, Yohji Yamamoto, Viridi-anne and Mihara Yasuhiro.

The store is currently running version 6.0, but you can still visit the archived version 2.0 here. You can also read about version 4.0 here.

I spent the summer of 2006 in London attending a three-week course in microeconomics at the London School Of Economics and Political Science (LSE). Personally, I found simple microeconomics to be applicable in many areas of life and back in Aarhus I was wondering if I could use it to explain why it is so difficult to meet new people in Aarhus.

In this essay about provincialism I used (a simplified version of) George Akerlof‘s lemon theory to analyse the situation. When you meet a stranger somewhere you can never know as much about the person as someone you have known for years, so you have to evaluate if this person is worth talking to, or if you would be better of talking to someone else. For reasons of simplicity let’s say that there are only two kinds of people: interesting people and boring people. If the stranger actively tries to have a conversation with you, you might easily draw the conclusion that he doesn’t have enough friends for himself, and thus you can be fairly certain that he is a boring person, since nobody else wants to hang out with him either. All the interesting people already have enough friends, since they are so interesting.

This is clearly not how it actually happens inside one’s head. However, microeconomic theory was never meant to predict thought – only behavior on a statistical level of generality. In this sense, the theory fits quite well: everyone in Aarhus seems to be going out with their own friends all the time, and if you try to talk to someone you don’t know, they will often perceive of you as strange and rather suspicious.

The essay was published in the October 2006 issue of Delfinen (#127).

Read the full text. (Danish only)

Quickwood is a US based sales company, specializing in products for the wood working industry. In 2001, I was approached by them because they needed a simple and bandwidth effective visualization of their latest product.

The product was still patent pending so I had to keep my mouth shut, and started working on the animation. I decided to use Flash, which at the time was still a relatively new thing on the Internet. Using simple ActionScript programming the video uses almost no bandwidth, and Quickwood was pleased with the result. They later decided to develop the animation further, adding stacking robots to each end of the conveyer belt, and speeding it up to give a more realistic example of how the actual production belt would look.

During my first year of studying (and ever since, actually) I’ve spent a lot of time having lunch with my study group. However, we never just had lunch. During the meal discussions always revolved around the quality of the food and the atmosphere.

We tried different canteens on campus and compared results, and in the September 2006 issue of Delfinen (#126) we wrote a comparative review.

The review sparked some controvercy: a week after it was published my editor at Delfinen received a two page letter from the Dean, complaining that our review had errors of fact and that we were destroying the working environment for the employees.

The review is written by Kasper Schiølin, Janus Novak Olesen, Lasse Damgaard and Mathias Vestergaard. Photos by Lasse Damgard.

Read the review (Danish only)

In our fourth article for Delfinen, published in September 2006 (#126), Helle Rohde Andersen and I tried to reveal the various dresscodes on the different faculties on campus. Although it was meant as a funny exaggeration, some people took it too seriously and I was actually threatened at a party, a couple of months later.

“It is correct. There is no official dresscode on campus (although you sometimes wish there was). However, this does not mean that you can dress in whatever way you want. There are plenty of implicit dresscodes that you must know about.”

Read the article (Danish only)

Consumption of goods has become an activity involving ever more products and choices and ever younger consumers. Today, shopping is considered a normal activity for teenagers. However, in a market governed by complex and opaque laws of commerce, being young and unexperienced can make shopping rather haphazardous. Especially, when it comes to warranties and return policies.

Sikker Shopping (“Safe Shopping”) is an online education system that helps teenagers become better shoppers. The system is built around a story frame where the user must first chose a cyber friend. Tests amongst users have shown, that this first seemingly unimportant step is extremely important for the user’s feeling of being involved in what happens (the selection of a cyber friend).

After choosing and customizing a cyber friend, the user can proceed to actual game. In this part, the user is presented with quizzes of varying length. Each quiz rewards the user with an appropriate score depending on the correctnes of the answers.

Chosing the right cyber friend is extremely important to the teenage users.

The quizzes incorporate text, images and video and the cyber friend is always around to assist.

The sytem was designed by Warnich IT. The short ,ovies were produced by Puste Grise Op Productions. Most of the technical implementations of the quiz module wer conducted by me.

Try Sikker Shopping (in Danish)

Read more about the project (in Danish)

How does a phone conversation actually work? This is the central question in this exam project.

For this project, I will utilize theories from Niklas Luhmann, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Erving Goffman, William Labov, David Fanshel and Robert Nofsinger. Practically, this paper analyzes phone conversations from the satirical TV program “De Uaktuelle Nyheder” with Mikael Bertelsen.

This paper was written in collaboration with Lassegruppen.

Download this paper (pdf)

In our second semester course on programming and systems development we were allowed to choose between three exam questions. We chose the question titled “data-mining and visualization”.

The task was to build a program that would allow us to parse and analyze a series of well-defined mailinglist log files. The actual effect of reading our project report can (for the twisted mind at least) be rather funny since we consequently translate all programming expressions into Danish. The illustration to the right is the RFC 822 definition of a valid e-mail adress, written as a regular expression.

This paper was written in collaboration with Lassegruppen.

Download the project report (pdf) – Download the JAVA source code