Gourmet Cat Food
One of the most interesting challenges I have faced as an art director was the Gourmet cat food campaign. The Guardian was to run a 6-month column in the Observer Food Monthly written by Archie the Cat, the furry face of Gourmet. We'd needed to produce covers of Archie in various monthly scenarios but they needed to look very hi-end and sophisticated.
I mocked up the 6 covers for approval but editorial as well as the client and after the go-ahead we needed to commission a cat for a photoshoot. Sounds simple enough? Think again. Due to British Persian cat cats having issues with fur this time of year, then we needed to look for a tougher European breed and an agency that specialises in animal portrait photography. Our picture desk found based in Prague and did an excellent job of arranged such a complicated shoot where logistics and timing was everything. They arranged for 6 Persian cats, identical to Archie, to travel from Prague by boat, to be photographed in a studio in Kings Cross.
The day of the shoot arrived and we needed to ensure all props needed from the mock designs arrived safely and the level of detail and art direction was very high as we only had one go at this. Nine hours (not lives) later and we had nailed it. The different cats had to be regularly rotated to make sure they weren't getting too tired (or bored) and their owner produced many specialist tricks to ensure the photographer got the shots he needed. The model cats were even played some music while they were being shot. Adele seemed to go down well...
Back at the office, we arranged a post production artist to bring the pics to life and she had the unenviable task of cutting out the cats out (hair by hair) to place on different coloured backgrounds. The final designs were superb and really stood out on the glossy Guardian food magazine. There was a print piece inside to go with each cover as well as some lovely illustrations by Janne iivonen. A really unusual campaign which needed huge planning and skilled execution but received huge praise by all. .
