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We caught up with Guillermo Blanco, Head of Global Partnerships for Closca Design.
Closca create iconic products and services to generate social movement. The products and services are designed to help Inspire Change in people's attitudes, and thereby create a better future for all. We asked him about his journey working for the innovative brand and what his favourite products were, and here’s what she had to say.
1. Explain a bit about your role for Closca
I am a "B2B - freak", committed to generating meaningful connections with individuals and companies with the aim to build a community of co-responsible partnerships. Digital and offline global partnerships that generate immediate and impactful value to the triple bottom line: People, Profit, Planet.
As head of Global Distribution and Partnerships, my mission is to develop Closca brand business in the markets of Europe, Asia and America and to create the first global brand that segments people by their purposes.
Achieving this is a difficult but wonderful challenge. That is why we find in our successful partnerships with World-Class Companies (such as Apple, (RED), Ducati, Lime, among others) the best strategy
2. We understand micro mobility is a primary focus for Closca when designing the helmets. What impact do you think COVID has had on micro mobility?
Covid has not changed a trend, it has only accelerated our paradigm and has tested our ability to adapt as humans beings. In fact, it has confirmed something that many of us were already convinced of: it is urgent to bet on new ways of moving to overcome a collapsed model.
The new era of mobility has been underway for a long time and nothing more and nothing less is proposed than to make cities more friendly. But we are not talking about a great revolution because now we are all going to move on a scooter. The rise of individual means of transport such as the scooter is a consequence of an urgent need to reduce the noise and smoke we breathe in cities. At this point, not only the world of design and new technologies must act, but it must be a joint collaboration with architects and urban planners. Thanks to this new mobility, architecture can pose challenges such as completely changing streets that were conceived for cars and that today still only leave 20% of their space to another type of mobility (be it bikes, scooters or pedestrians).
In the future, cities should be more friendly, green and sustainable. What for many is just a dream, is also a challenge for us. That's why we bring style and safety to bicycles and electric scooters on the streets. We are committed to sustainable mobility. No smoke. No noise. No nothing... with everything.
3. Our favourite Closca product at The Electric Scooter Co is the classic helmet with NFC chip. Who came up with the idea and do you think it is a technical revolution for bike helmets?
We have always been very ambitious and, in fact, we always want to reach as many people as possible.
That is why our products must inevitably speak a digital language that connects with our new way of behaving.
Image: Citybikenyc.com
Inspired by the Guggenheim Museum building in New York, the purpose was to generate a symbol of that necessary change in cities, a symbol that ended up materializing in a helmet. With time, a lot of effort on the part of the team and a little luck, the product became iconic. It is the strength of making a good design, that you not only get a beautiful and useful product, but also something capable of inspiring and easy to tell. If that beauty, design and technology are linked to a basic purpose such as that moving through cities should not necessarily involve more smoke and noise, we think that it is normal to obtain a great reception and involvement from people. Consumption is increasingly conscious and responsible.
4. What plans do Closca have for products in the future
Our motivation, the brand purpose, is to inspire change. We are a pioneering brand positioned in the purpose of awareness. We believe that the word design itself means to create an attitude. Design is not drawing, it is an attitude and a responsibility.
That's why Closca will keep on creating products and services that help Inspire Change in people's attitudes and thereby create a better future for all.
Images: Closca Design, Artforum