Welcome to Optimism

martin cole

Late last Friday night Martin Cole, Wieden + Kennedy London's head of planning, passed away peacefully following his battle with cancer.

For those of you who knew him or had the opportunity to work with him you should know that he was the same old Martin right up until the end. The day before he died he was still cracking jokes when he got married to his lovely Swedish partner Lotte in the hospital.

Martin was only with Wieden + Kennedy a relatively short time, and he was diagnosed with his illness shortly after joining us. But in the few months he was with us he made a major contribution. Despite his condition he made the decision to continue working up until very recently, so this news may come as a shock to some.

We'll miss his wisdom, his insight, his enthusiasm and his humour.

Apart from Lotte, Martin leaves a wonderful little boy called Casper, who we are sure will continue where his dad left off.

This is an edit of some pics of Martin that we put together very quickly as a way of remembering how positive and full of life he was.

quick tour of our new building

Roof terrace
The move is done and we're now spread across two buildings, either side of Hanbury Street. Like any move, it's been a big upheaval: we're surrounded by crates and boxes, it's hard to tell what's rubbish and what's valuable equipment and everything's a bit provisional. But the new space looks awesome and we now have room to breathe and work. Above: the roof terrace. Nice views.

Stairwell
Some stairs. Useful when moving between floors.

2nd floor

A big, empty bit.

Garage

Paul and Angus creating magic in a garage. On cliched, uncomfortable bean bags.

Mezzanine

Stairs to the mezzanine.

Nev

Nev, in the corridor that reminds me of The Masque of the Red Death.

Black bog 

Black bog.

2nd floor work area

Some people working.

Kitchen

Kitchen, with mezzanine area above. Shame we couldn't manage to get cabinets in matching colours.

1st 

First floor from mezzanine

From above

First floor
First floor workers
Sam lucy donna Platform top down

I stuck myself to the ceiling like a human fly to take this shot.

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