Mark Chalmers (39) was born in the deepest countryside of the South of England – it took him a full day to cycle to the nearest shop – and later lived in Brixton, London, for 12 years. He studied architecture, but started a career in advertising in the 90’s at HHCL + Partners in London – he was brought in to take campaigns beyond traditional media. In 2000 he moved to Amsterdam to become executive creative director at the newborn Strawberryfrog. Apart from creating global and unorthodox campaigns, he was responsible for founding Blueberryfrog, one the first guerrilla agencies in the world – later the two frogs merged. In 2004, he founded Creative Social, a global  collective of digital creatives that share knowledge and inspire each other. And in 2008 Chalmers joined Perfect Fools (established in Stockholm in 2002) to work on brands like Converse, K-Swiss and H&M. Shortly after, he founded the Amsterdam office, where he is still ECD.

As a kid, what were your most creative moments?

I took everything apart to see how it worked. I still do that today. I was also in a band from an early age and making effects pedals from old solenoids & tape recorders required a particular skill, they’d be wired into the mains & smoking while we adjusted the ‘grunge’.

Which creative effort has given you the most satisfaction?

Here’s a couple:

A little bit green behind the ears but certainly ambitious i tracked down the team who made the world’s biggest inflatables to deepest Canada, went there & worked with them to create a huge inflatable Tango (a soft drink owned by Britvic) walk through experience. It was shaped as a tongue. It waggled and moaned. we took it to gay pride. 20,000 people walked through it in a day, it got trashed and all the kinky props & clothing from the TV films displayed in there were stolen. Let’s think of it as some form of subversive appreciation.

Creative Social has been enormously rewarding for collaborative creative input & output. We founded it in 2004 when there were a lot of pioneers out there but no collective compass. The ad industry has traditionally been protective. The digital industry was just too vast in opportunity to even contemplate thinking you had something special. We rallied the troops and have been sharing since. Twice a year we meet up somewhere in the world, face to face, just 35 individuals each time – taken from a membership of over 150. We’ve just written a book. “Digital Advertising past, present & future”.

What fascinates you?

I’ve collected, followed & shot street art for over 20 years now. Amsterdam’s very own Boris aka Delta talks about it as ‘the mould of a city’, it’s a natural growth that we give the city. tells stories, tells moods, gives colour, is often topical. Advertising is art with a deadline. Online gives us the chance to be more immediate and topical. I’ve got a few art shows going on in my garage from the end of the summer.

Who is your favourite creator?

Influences are ongoing… Here’s one from past and one from present.

Carlo Mollino was a big influence. A true renaissance man. Architect, champion skier, racing driver, furniture designer and photographer. He created chairs based on the line of a stiletto heel. I  especially like his arabesque table [created in 1950 - AAB] based on ski tracks in powder.

Zevs’ liquidated logo series. One of his past projects included ‘visually kidnapping’ a Lavazzo model from a huge building wrap. He literally climbed up and cut the model out. He had an ongoing dialogue with Lavazza over it for at least 4 years. We essentially work with and for brands, there’s clearly some smart people out there reacting to what we do.

When did you decide, I want to work in advertising?

At the age of 11 I wanted to build my own home so I studied architecture. I’ve always liked building environments or installations and to me marketing is essentially creating a brand environment – in architecture we were all aware of the long lead times to create something. Advertising was an unashamed short cut to create – It’s the same thinking process with quicker gratification – very much a Perfect Fools experience, born out of core digital production we don’t have layers of account resource, we’re very hands on and productive.

What’s your most important lesson in advertising?

“In beginners minds there are many possibilities, in experts minds there are few“.

My good friend Graham Fink had this on his studio wall and practiced it readily. We’re so conditioned that we must have various experts to do various jobs. We’re not doing plumbing here, we’re here to inspire and you can’t predict the minutiae that make that. Sure, plan around it, but have fun.

What’s the most exciting ad project you ever worked on?

Curating a choir out of the Japanese staff of sports brand ASICS to sing for their heritage brand Onitsuka Tiger was pretty surreal. Few spoke English, many were politely reserved, all were good sports. It was a lot of fun and there are very very few companies out there that would show such good faith. Full credit to the late & gracious Mr Onitsuka San and his amazing team.

What’s your favourite place in Amsterdam?

Right now, the North [on the Northern side of the IJ river – AAB]. NDSM, the warehouses, the old squats, it’s fascinating and on the point of change. There are a few gems amongst it including the skate park in NDSM warf and Noorderlicht cafe. There’s a single light bulb on, way up in that huge redundant crane. Who’s in there?

What would you like to change in Amsterdam?

Nothing. It’s like living in a Tim Burton set with wifi. Why change that?