Superimpose foregrounds sustainability for London College of Fashion students

London-based creative agency Superimpose starts a new educational programme for aspiring creative talent. Its non-commercial creative platform SERVICES UNKNOWN has partnered with University of the Arts London: London College of Fashion to launch a new agenda aimed at enhancing the creative curriculum.

The partnership is a completely new model for a knowledge exchange, as Superimpose steps across industry borders to collaborate with one of the world’s most prestigious arts and design institutions.

The UAL partnership launches with The Anti-Fragile Collective, a week-long crash course facilitated by Superimpose as in-residency course leaders. From 27th-31st January 2020, Superimpose will take over London College of Fashion’s entire Lime Grove Campus with up to 450 Year One students from the School of Media and Communication in attendance. They will be invited to become future agents of change and to manifest their conscious vulnerabilities within today’s turbulent cultural-social-political climate, with an emphasis on sustainability. The week-long takeover will explore the opportunities that future creatives can carve for themselves - like Brexit, the climate crisis, Extinction Rebellion and more.

Living and breathing the theme of ‘Anti-Fragile’, students will take over all floors, OOH displays and facades of the building to create a walk-in exhibition space that is presented to industry on the final day. Embracing unknown outputs, Superimpose will enable multidisciplinary teams to generate versatile outcomes that showcase the calibre of creative talent at hand. As experts in sustainability, Superimpose has sustainably sourced all of the materials for the week-long activities, with end of life solutions planned for every output.

“It is incredibly exciting to be the first agency to be given a whole week’s programme by the LCF,” commented Ollie Olanipekun, Founder and Creative Director of Superimpose. “With a sole focus on Year One students, we will be the first to recognise this generation's talent before they graduate. Flipping traditional teaching formats, our aim is to challenge the familiar industry focus on final year Grad Shows by providing a platform for those artists already demonstrating potential or blossoming earlier.”

“I was eager to work on a Knowledge Exchange project with Superimpose to see the impact and value that could be generated within a co-creative environment,” commented Daniel Caulfield-Sriklad, Knowledge Exchange Leader, School of Media and Communication, at LCF, UAL.
"The ethos of Superimpose is all about doing things differently and having worked in higher education, it’s clear that across all sectors we need to promote, encourage and support new systems that celebrate uncertainty, conscious vulnerability, change and collective wellbeing. This is the spirit of the Anti-Fragile Collective".

“Designing the Anti-Fragile curriculum alongside Superimpose has been an ‘anti-fragile’ experience as we are unable to foresee the outcomes of this collaboration. In order to teach anti-fragility we also need to practice it. Working with students, I have seen how they are governed by their anxieties, making events like this hugely important in empowering them to value ‘anti-fragility’ as a hard skill and one of the most important skills at this moment in time.”

The aim of the partnership with University of the Arts London long-term is to create an annual rolling programme that will continue to nurture the new generation of creatives.

“For over three years, we have been supporting students and aspiring creatives across the country, with the aim of making a positive impact across education. We want to engage not only creatives and the industry but also businesses and the wider public, to demonstrate that moving beyond the traditional ‘agency’ model can encourage theory to become action and to show that education doesn’t always have to exist within the classroom, creating what we might call a ‘supercurriculum’,” added Olanipekun.

Superimpose is a new world agency for a new generation, challenging brands to go further. Independent, culturally rooted and globally active, it pushes the limits of experience to spark meaningful conversation. It combines insight, strategy and creative and believes in being self-generative and proactive, in championing the conscious consumer and to always think environmental, social and community first. It also encourages the brands it works with to do the same.

Its open-ended platform SERVICES UNKNOWN facilitates new ideas, discussion and events vital to the future of creativity and community.

Clients include The Woolmark Company, British Fashion Council, Burberry, Adidas, etc.