Gucci Kicks Off Skateboarding-Inspired Watch Campaign With Art Mural

Fiona Ma

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LONDON — Gucci is taking to the streets for its latest watch campaign, Gucci Grip, named after the grip tape that skateboarders use. The brand has collaborated with skaters in cities including London, Paris, Tokyo, Shanghai and Seoul, for the new campaign.

In an attempt to reflect the cool, underground street scene, Gucci commissioned artist Kieron Livingstone to create a mural on Brick Lane in East London and invited guests to meet collaborators of the campaign in a warehouse basement in Camden.

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For the mural, Livingstone worked with the brand’s house codes, such as the interlocking G’s, mixing in red and green and animal prints.

“I played with the idea of transformation, since it’s quite unexpected to tie skateboarding with watches. I was also interested in magic and so I put in images of rabbits to symbolize that, alongside the sculptural elements of the skateboard surrounding an image of a watch,” he said.

Along with the mural, Livingstone also created visuals for the brand’s social media channels. Other collaborators on the skateboarding project included Unity, a queer skateboarding group; Japanese skater Shinpei Ueno with his local community, and skater Dan Fisher-Eustance from London.

The campaign documents these individuals in their hometown, doing tricks and skating with friends in Gucci gear. The film debuted on the brand’s social media channels and the watches are available to purchases in store and online.

The London shots include Fisher-Eustance with his friends, and elderly women, in their neighborhood skating and bouncing on a trampoline.

“My favorite part of making the campaign was when we involved grannies in the shoot. I mean I was with five of my friends, so it was a pretty fun day, but the fact that there were grannies bouncing on trampolines as well made it even better,” Fisher-Eustance said.

Shot by different photographers, Gucci pieced the film together using glitchy video effects in a bid to show its youthful side and its ongoing quest to be down with the cool kids.

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