John Weich (California, 1971) is a copywriter in the most pure sense of the word. After graduating at UCLA, he obtained a Master’s in Literature at New York University. He subsequently became an editor for Wallpaper magazine in London, co-founded a magazine called 34 in Instanbul, and wrote for ArtReview in London. His culturally agnostic disposition made him move to Amsterdam in 1994. Though he only worked for the international agencies in town – Wieden+Kennedy, Riot/180 and Strawberry Frog – he is virtually an Amsterdammer by now. Today he is running the creative show at Lemon Scented Tea, together with Rogier Heijning. Among other brands he works for K-Swiss. Alongside his work in advertising, John is a regular columnist for Wallpaper and Contagious Magazine.

As a kid, what were your most creative moments?
Apparently I illustrated my own books from around age 4 on. Only a few of those books remain, however, and I’m quite sure that the rest simply didn’t exist: they were conjured out of parental pride.

Which creative effort has given you the most satisfaction?
Launching 34 magazine in Istanbul was a pretty satisfying moment. Launching a somewhat sexy lifestyle magazine in Turkey wasn’t the safest bet, but five years on flipping through the first copy remains satisfying. The lush printing technique and Arabic-inspired fonts could still hold their own against any magazine today.

What fascinates you?
A Don Delillo sentence, a sly Nabokovian aside, an essay (any essay) by Joseph Brodsky. These are the famous rewriters. Anything by Joseph Beuys. Any song I can listen to 40 times in a row without actually hearing the music. Living in post-fall Russia circa 1992, the memories of which continue to influence my future.

Who is your favourite creator?
I’ve been thinking a lot about Martin Kippenberger the last few years. Kippenberger, who lived his life like it was an actual artwork. A restless multitalent. At one point or another he worked the stage as an actor, organized exhibitions, ran a club, founded a punk band, started a novel he never completed and bought a gas station that he designated as an artwork. Once, he created 7 metro stops around the world, thereby suggesting the existence of a planetary underground system. He was faintly amusing and patently obvious. His antics make Damian Hirst look tame. And all the while he trotted across the globe blowing his sizeable inheritance. To Kippenberger, art was a syndrome. He ricocheted across the globe as if travel were a necessity. His ‘Peters’ project may be the most hilarious work of art ever made. He’s actually the personality behind the style and tone of voice of a few of our campaigns and stories.

When did you decide, I want to work in advertising?
I’ve always been able to coexist peacefully with editorial, journalism and advertising. Sometimes more of the one, sometimes more of the other. Yet even though I always made it a rule to be immersed somehow, someway in pop culture, I never felt compelled to help dictate it through advertising. I think the moment I realized I actively wanted to embrace the idea of advertising – and this wasn’t very long ago – was when I read through a nifty little book on Howard Gossage [a famous admen in the 50’s/60’s, called ‘The Socrates of San Francisco’, AAB]. He set the precedent for the role of a non-environmental – someone like me who entered advertising through a side door – and made a strong case for advertising as content, which is one of our defining philosophies at Lemon scented tea.

What’s your most important lesson in advertising?
Intuition is more important than most want to believe.

What’s the most exciting ad project you ever worked on?
I’m like an LA waiter who after 15 years of playing bit roles on pretty serious Hollywood productions suddenly finds himself in the lead of a pet project by Paul Thomas Anderson. Which is to say, the best stories are still to come. However, buy me a drink and ask about my craziest editorial moment and I might tell you a story about Tracy Emin, Jamie Oliver and me behind a piano at the Groucho Club in London…

What’s your favourite place in Amsterdam?
There’s a nice little café buried deep in the Westergas terrain where I like to take my lunches.

What would you like to change in Amsterdam?
I probably sound like Geert Wilder’s [a right wing populist in the Dutch Parliament, AAB] posterboy of integration, but the only thing I’d really change is the utter lack of cycling acumen amongst the tourists. For the rest, I savor the good and actually relish a bit of the bad too, because bad in Holland still has a Disneyesque quality compared to bad elsewhere in the world.