![\"20160909_Daan](\"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/20160909_Daan-Melis_door-Jantine-Albers_web-8.jpg\")
<\/a>Until recently Daan Melis worked for\u00a0Eindhoven365 and Eindhoven247 – the organisations responsible for city marketing. But it was\u00a0time for a more independent development – and a roll out of\u00a0his city center concepts. “I am convinced that we can reach our goals faster if we operate\u00a0as a kind of movement. Of course we stay close to the dynamic team of Eindhoven247.”<\/p>\nMelis says he has “creative hands-on solutions” for\u00a0the changing habits of consumers\u00a0and thereby can connect with the profile of Eindhoven. The brand of the city – symbolized by TDK, the three initials of Technology,\u00a0Design and Knowledge – must therefore be visible throughout the whole year. “That way it can act as a tool for shop owners to make more sales.”<\/p>\n
Melis explicitly links his plans to\u00a0the Binnenstadsvisie<\/em> (City Center Plan) which was\u00a0presented in July. “It’s about mentality, money and collaboration. In the four years that I was partly responsible for Eindhoven’s\u00a0strategic and creative brand, we have seen that the brand can convey a lot of power and can help to give a collective boost to the city. The city is internationally known for TDK but for visitors and tourists this is not yet clear enough. We want to strengthen the TDK-profile by helping retailers, restaurants and cultural institutions to become on-brand<\/em> themselves, and by providing design objects to the public space. We also want to make technology visible and tangible with relevant experiments whenever we can.\u00a0The result should provide a clear profile of the city, through\u00a0which we can reach the wish\u00a0lists of international tourists, visitors and business people.”<\/p>\n Of course, Eindhoven already\u00a0has\u00a0the Dutch Design Week, a huge success. It has GLOW and the Dutch Technology Week. And there are other events and presentations that reflect the atmosphere of TDK quite well. But the question has been asked more often: how good it would be\u00a0if these\u00a0temporary manifestations would get a more permanent and visible character? What if we could really infuse\u00a0the city – and most certainly the city center – with this mentality of TDK?<\/p>\n Melis: “These are legitimate questions and concerns. We think we can provide\u00a0an answer with\u00a0our Roundabout Design Route,<\/em>\u00a0something that would best be described as a kind of subway system of storylines. If you would project all those Roundabout routes on a\u00a0map of Eindhoven, and would combine graphics with the storylines, one would\u00a0automatically create the subway map”, Melis says. “It nourishes the ambition, that’s what\u00a0we like. It’s actually quite simple, a logical connection between the design-oriented institutions like\u00a0the Design Academy, the Philips Museum, Kazerne, van Abbe Museum, Designhuis, Schellensfabriek, NRE grounds, Kanaalstraat, VDMA and TAC. The Brand Store near\u00a0the railway station will be\u00a0start and finish.”<\/p>\n The name for all\u00a0these routes \u00a0is ‘Roundabout’<\/em>. This way, the\u00a0Roundabout Design Route will be there to enjoy design 365 days a year. “But there may also be a Roundabout Philips, a Roundabout DAF, a Roundabout Fashion, or even a Roundabout Industrial Revolution. You might think a history route is not on-brand<\/em> for our city, but\u00a0the opposite is true. It is precisely this period that was typical for the mentality that still characterises Eindhoven: the basis for everything\u00a0we are known for.”<\/p>\n So it’s all about the movement, mobility, going from a to b.\u00a0“But, just like the real roundabouts,\u00a0you can also hop on and off, constantly making choices to stay relevant for this international design-loving clientele, 52 weeks a year.”<\/p>\n Bright\u00a0talents<\/strong> Van Asseldonk is already preparing the towers, but the actual building will be done in Eindhoven tradition, one of co-creation. “Established designers will work together\u00a0with international bright talents. Imagine what this will look like: VDMA and\u00a0NRE as creative hotspots, with public presentations every Friday. So the whole city can see what has been achieved in that particular week. That’s the energy we are looking for, that’s the mentality we need. And meanwhile we are\u00a0building a strong network of new Bright talent ambassadors.”<\/p>\n From a 7 to a 9<\/strong><\/p>\n Although Melis’s plans could make a strong contribution to the\u00a0fulfillment of all the ideas from the Binnenstadsvisie, execution is not easy. “Although the municipality keeps saying that we need\u00a0less regulations, the creative ideas of the world’s best designers often collide with the safe pragmatic thinking of some of the\u00a0civil servants. We can only be successful when we align all initiatives and events with our ambitions, and make smart connections. We used to be happy with 7 out of 10, but we clearly need to be at least a 9. We just have to do this together with every responsible person in the city.”<\/p>\n Out-of-office<\/strong><\/p>\n Melis has recently\u00a0drawn his team into a beautiful spot in the heart of the city: right at the entrance of the Heuvel, with the exit on the side of the Vestdijk. “We have called it Out-of-Office. That shows\u00a0our mentality, not wanting to be locked up, but open and willing\u00a0to tackle any\u00a0project without conforming to\u00a0the normal procedures. Here we already have prepared a showcase of all the projects that we are going to roll out in the city center. Out-of-Office<\/em> we can experiment, and invite interesting people to think along about the future of the city.”<\/p>\n The City Council will discuss the ‘binnenstadsvisie’ later this month.<\/em><\/p>\n Pictures Daan Melis and Out-Of-Office by Jantine Albers<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SOEPS\u00a0is back in town. Daan Melis, once\u00a0the editor of SOEPS magazine, is now working on other ideas, but under the same brand name. “What used to be a magazine, has transformed into other cool things.” And cool, in Melis’s world, is also full of ambition. “I think we have a strong plan to restore relevance […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1568,"featured_media":70542,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[7966,7968,490,482,486,484,7971,7973,829],"location":[],"article_type":[],"serie":[],"archives":[],"internal_archives":[],"reboot-archive":[],"class_list":["post-70522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sustainability-nl","tag-aart-van-asseldonk","tag-daan-melis","tag-design-en","tag-economy","tag-geen-categorie-en","tag-innovation","tag-roundabout","tag-roundabout-design","tag-technology"],"blocksy_meta":[],"acf":{"subtitle":"","text_display_homepage":false},"author_meta":{"display_name":"Bart Brouwers","author_link":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/author\/brewbart\/"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/metrokaart-Roundabout-1-300x212.jpg","coauthors":[],"tax_additional":{"categories":{"linked":["Sustainability<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Sustainability<\/span>"]},"tags":{"linked":["Aart van Asseldonk<\/a>","Daan Melis<\/a>","design<\/a>","economy<\/a>","Geen categorie<\/a>","innovation<\/a>","Roundabout<\/a>","Roundabout Design<\/a>","technology<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Aart van Asseldonk<\/span>","Daan Melis<\/span>","design<\/span>","economy<\/span>","Geen categorie<\/span>","innovation<\/span>","Roundabout<\/span>","Roundabout Design<\/span>","technology<\/span>"]}},"comment_count":"0","relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 10 years ago","modified":"Updated 10 years ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on September 13, 2016","modified":"Updated on September 13, 2016"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on September 13, 2016 8:39 am","modified":"Updated on September 13, 2016 8:39 am"},"featured_img_caption":"","series_order":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1568"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70522"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70522\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"article_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article_type?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"serie","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/serie?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"archives","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/archives?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"internal_archives","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/internal_archives?post=70522"},{"taxonomy":"reboot-archive","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ioplus.nl\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/reboot-archive?post=70522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/a>Melis and his team want to create different storylines by connecting the city’s interesting public places\u00a0with\u00a0the stores and\u00a0temporary exhibitions, along a shared\u00a0route. “During the fashion weekend<\/em>\u00a0hat theme of course can be\u00a0mainly fashion, but there\u00a0can also be different cross-overs with design and tech. Eventually we will have several routes that coexist next to each other, simultaneously.”<\/p>\n
\nMelis suddenly takes a large sheet\u00a0of paper and starts drawing towers. They are all made up of several layers, some have decorations, others haven’t,\u00a0one is slim and has the wings of a mill, another is broader and clearly habitable. “Look\u00a0at\u00a0this,\u00a0designer Aart van Asseldonk calls them\u00a0Follies. Completely\u00a0useless structures arising from a design vision, but to which you can add features and in doing so give them a new functionality. We could let\u00a0them communicate with each other, with, for example, light signals. We could\u00a0make it a hotel room out of it for design-seekers. Or offer them to startups so they can\u00a0show their experiments to the audience. In doing so\u00a0the process and the approach can\u00a0visualise what we are good at, here in Eindhoven.”<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n