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2013 · Creative / Copywriter · adam&eveDDB London
There is a specific kind of madness that takes over when high fashion meets a deep discount. It's a primal, frantic state of mind where rationality completely vanishes, and the hunt for a half-price designer piece turns otherwise sophisticated shoppers into absolute forces of nature. For the Harvey Nichols Summer Sale, we wanted to hold a mirror up to that exact feeling — but do it with the high-concept visual execution that the brand's iconic advertising history demanded.
The insight was simple: when a sale is this good, people completely lose their heads. To bring that metaphor to life, we dressed models in pristine, immaculate garments from the season's finest designer collections — and then gave them the heads of actual, literal chickens. It was an unapologetic, delightfully surreal, and heavily tongue-in-cheek take on the phrase "running around like a headless chicken."
Captured with high-fashion lighting and deadpan styling, the contrast between the elegance of the clothes and the utter absurdity of the livestock perfectly hit the brand's legendary sweet spot of beautiful subversion.
Recognition — D&AD Wood Pencil (Outdoor Advertising / Art Direction). Campaign BIG Awards: Shortlisted (Fashion & Retail). Featured in Trend Hunter, Lürzer's Archive, and global creative showcases.
Fashion · OOH · Print · PR
A year on from the sale campaign, Harvey Nichols needed a summer sale idea that lived up to the same standard: a single, high-concept visual for print and out-of-home that treated a discount as a piece of fashion imagery. Toby Brewer worked on it as a Creative / Copywriter at adam&eveDDB London with art director Nikki Lindman, photographer Daniel Stier and stylist Priscilla Kwateng.
When high fashion meets a deep discount a specific kind of madness takes over. Rational, sophisticated shoppers become forces of nature, and the English language already has the perfect description for that state: running around like a headless chicken. The idea was to take the phrase completely literally rather than gesture at it.
Models were dressed in pristine pieces from the season's designer collections, then given the heads of actual chickens. Lit and styled with deadpan high-fashion seriousness, the contrast between couture tailoring and livestock is what carries the joke, and it sits exactly in the Harvey Nichols tradition of beautiful subversion. The campaign ran as outdoor and print, picked up a D&AD Wood Pencil for outdoor advertising and art direction, was shortlisted at the Campaign BIG Awards in fashion and retail, and was featured in Lürzer's Archive, Trend Hunter and other creative showcases.
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