Introducing James Bull...

by Emma Bower

With a studio like a scene from a James Bond movie, gadgets galore and, puzzlingly, a table tennis table taking centre stage in the room, you would expect James Bull, founder and executive creative director of Moving Brands to echo the slick ambience.

Instead, an imposing figure appears sporting jeans and luminous yellow trainers.

James set up Moving Brands, an award-winning, independent branding company, with two friends from Central Saint Martins soon after graduating in 1997.

“What we did isn’t what I would recommend."

Moving Brands

"We started Moving Brands six months out of college. We all did a bit of this and a bit of that and quite quickly realised that this could take a f**king long time to get anywhere and you would have to endure other people’s not-so-great ideas.

"So we just kind of went out on a limb and started it ourselves. We all came together and formed this thing with a belief that we had a different angle on how you can do branding and how you do design.

"We founded it basically with a couple of student loans, one laptop, and we had enough money to put a deposit down on one of these floors.

"For the first three years none of us had any money and we didn’t pay ourselves, it was all about making money to keep the business going.

"Gradually, that turned into something where we now pay ourselves and the business does really well.”

Humble beginnings

Moving Brands has come a long way from its humble beginnings.

“We have studios in London, Zurich and also one in Tokyo.

"I spread across all of them to see all of the work and try and steer things.

"I don’t really do the design any more, it is all about powering the teams to create stuff.

“It was really difficult going from being a designer to realising that you are an owner of a business and then realising that there are more talented people around you and that process of letting go is really difficult.

"I think I’m much better at directing a project than I am doing the design.

"It was a struggle in the early years.

"Do I miss designing? No, because I feel that I am involved with it every day but I’m not the person who is laying it out or saying this shape is amazing.”

Clients

Moving Brand’s clients have included Nokia, Vodafone, Saville Row tailor Norton & Sons and luxury, ready-to-wear menswear brand, E. Tautz.

“We do quite a lot of fashion work – London College of Fashion was quite a big client of ours for three or four years. We helped them do their Royal Academy catwalk show.”

When asked about Moving Brand’s current projects, the interview transformed into a secret agent operation with James playing things close to his chest.

“Who can I talk about? We have got a couple of big American clients that I can’t talk to you about but they are probably the biggest clients that we have ever had.”

Creativity

Bull’s passion for the creative industry radiates from every aspect of the office.

A blackboard, he explains, is dedicated to a different theme every month.

The current theme is America, celebrating the recent launch of the San Francisco branch of Moving Brands.

An expertly chalked map of the area titled America F**k Yeah is adorned with Post-It notes flagging locations where members of staff have visited.

“I knew I always wanted to do something creative. I was always one of those kids who could draw really well at my school but it didn’t really mean anything because no one else could draw at all."

"So I think I was an average drawer but I always loved playing with colour. "

Filmmaking

"Filmmaking was a massive part of what inspired me and I think that’s why Moving Brands uses a lot of moving stuff. We make tonnes of films for people."

"When we make an identity it tends to move and have sound and work across a lot of different media.”

Bull is currently in the process of making a short film called Scotch Corner.

“It is about a woman who is in an abusive relationship and the film starts right in the middle of that abuse, so it is quite an intense opening to the film.

"She basically decides to leave, so the film is about her leaving and travelling northwards from London to visit someone from her past.

"That is a very personal project and I’m hoping to make more films.

"It might mean that Moving Brands gets more into making film content.

“Amazing films always get me."

'Astounded'

"I am constantly astounded by the fact that you can sit down for an hour and a half and everything else disappears while you watch this thing."

"It is amazing the way the brain and your emotions are wired to a moving image."

"I think it’s incredible."

With the sound of a table tennis match getting underway, Bull continued to explain what inspires him.

“I sometimes talk about things that vibrate.

"There are objects in the world that are just objects and every now and then there is an object which makes you go ‘wow, look at that.’

"They are different things for different people but, those are the things I find really inspiring.”

Central Saint Martins

Bull graduated from Central Saint Martins along with fellow Moving Brands founders Ben Wolstenholme and Joe Sharpe.

“One of the big things that CSM taught us was self belief.

"It was a very open course, with lots of different modules.

"You could do film, you could do advertising, you could do graphic design, so there was plenty of stuff to get your teeth into.

"It definitely instilled this kind of self-belief and also this appreciation of your peers being what’s really important.

"There was an element of arrogance that was coming out of Saint Martins especially during the late ’90s but I think it was good for us because we all believed that we could make things happen."

Advice

When asked what advice he would give to graduates today pursing a career in the arts, Bull said, “Don’t leave London after you graduate because it takes a lot of effort to get back.

"You lose the pace of it.

"Even if the rent is high just make it happen.

"Work your arse off and make sure you are making enough money to live because there are opportunities."