Cherryflava

RIP global economy

Found on the streets of London - this wilting, dying memorial of flowers with a sign reading ‘in loving memory of the boom economy’.

At least the guerrilla street artists are having fun.

[via PSFK and Wooster Collective]

FNB ATM in Kloof Street gets the treatment

Poor old ATMs in the country really do take a pounding. If they're not being blown up with stolen mine dynamite, they're now getting tagged with these brilliantly crafted symbols of danger (apparently made from pulped ATM slips).

Now there's a sound recycling idea for you.

Lovin' it. [thanks Warren]

Ikea thinks 'out of the box'

Ikea have done an amazing job of creating a brand that everybody considers when needing good quality cheap and cheerful furniture. We don't even have Ikea in South Africa, but we're still well aware of the brand even without mainstream advertising.

This guerrilla stunt using balconies in Frankfurt, which were made to look like storage boxes, is a cracker. In Europe, where space is at a premium - your balcony really does turn into valuable storage space. In South Africa it's often regarded as a convenient location for laundry [shudder]. [via]

Another guerrilla action they recently did was for their store opening in Brooklyn, NY - where this 20x20 box 'apartment' was left lying around. The box was packed with Ikea furniture, demonstrating what can be done furniture-wise with a small space.  [Via ]

Secret urban story discovered in Long Street, Cape Town

Perhaps part of the International Cape Town Book Fair, a secret Semacode driven urban story has been strategically placed at 10 different locations all along Cape Town's Long Street.

Books and stories are an escape from reality, The Long Street allows you to be present during the escape.

You can find ten chapters of the Long Street Story scattered on the street from the Turkish Baths down to Daddy Long Legs Hotel.

Enjoy.

From the looks of the 'location clue' photographs posted on the site, the 10 chapters of the story are going to take some eagle-eyes to find. Interesting way to blur the lines between fiction and reality.
Go check it out. Hopefully all the chapters are still there.
[Thanks Tessa]

See: The Long Story

Where's Wally migrates to Google Earth

In Canada, they call that dude who insists on getting lost in crowds that we refer to as Wally, Waldo.

Waldo sounds like someone who might carry concealed weapons and have a handbook of torture techniques tucked into is pants, so Wally is perhaps a bit less frightening for kids.

All the same, as part of a school project, Melanie Coles, a young web designer and artist, has set out to stimulate an intriguing  game. She has hidden a huge painting of Waldo on a rooftop somewhere in Vancouver, in hopes that it will appear on Google Earth. [via]

Needless to say she got an A for the project..and a considerable amount of international media exposure.
Fairy tales and children's characters are certainly 'flava of the month' for marketers right now.

More:
Where on earth is Waldo blog

Holes in space and time

Looking from afar as if somebody has escaped reality by ripping a hole right through it, there's something 'show stoppable' about these guerrilla street posters meant to promote HP photo paper.

Each black hole was made of paper and strategically placed around the city to fool people into thinking the background was actually a fake backdrop. In reality, the only fake thing was the hole printed on HP paper. [via]

Actually the way the rip has been made, it's more likely that something from the outside smashed its way in.

Thugs defacing billboard property

Thanks to Justin for sending in these 'tagged' mobile billboards, which he spotted somewhere on the side of the road [cnr of Kendal and Main in Diep River] in Cape Town.

It looks as if some little loser bastards with a can of paint have gone and destroyed this stylish, well-respected item of urban furniture with their culture of hip hop and Bape. But that's the beauty of the graphic illusion.

Even the wheels are missing, just adding to your desperation to move to Camps Bay.

Post-it note protest

Whenever people feel crime is getting out of hand and something has to be said about it, they seem to protest in public as a natural reaction.

In South Africa we've had slow marches to Parliament, car headlight burning protest action and other protest ideas, which last for a couple of hours and then get forgotten.

A protest group in Denmark, in response to recent violent incidents in Copenhagen [see, there's crime even in Copenhagen], have however done something a little different - using normal Post-it notes as a type of removable graffiti.

The post-it notes are placed throughout the city and carry handwritten statements and reminders such as "only the weak resort to violence".

Something different and to the point. If you understand Danish - check out more here. Or see a video here.

[via]

Mike Jackson's thrilling 25 year guerrilla makeover

To promote Thriller's special 25th year edition from Michael Jackson a group of dancers hit the streets of London and New York to dance the famous Thriller dance in a guerrilla marketing stunt that had citizens shocked and confused. [here's a link to the video clip]

We can just imagine what would happen if you did this in the middle of a busy St George's Mall in Cape Town. You would only have to crack up the tune and the general public will do the rest - the pro dancers are really not that necessary.

[via Invisible Red]

Guerrilla street furniture attack

Street lights, signage, protection bollards and road signs are all classic examples of urban furniture just crying out for some creative inspiration.

We've found a great gallery of fine examples of non-spray can urban graffiti. Above - a skate ramp promoting the African Nations Cup....or not.

A traffic light escape...