If you’re English, you’ve probably heard of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown, England’s most famous landscape architect.
Last year England celebrated the 300th year of his birth with events around the country all year long.
Brown was responsible for the landscapes of over 170 of Englands most famous estates. And, in England, when we say ‘estate’ we mean BIG house with LOTs of land. If you’ve ever been to England as a tourist visiting any one of these famous estates, chances are you saw Brown’s work, never realising that those ‘natural’ landscapes you were looking at were created by a landscape architect.
If you haven’t been to England but have seen Downton Abbey (filmed at Highclere Castle), well, that’s Brown too.
Anyway, one might assume there’d be a statue of Brown somewhere in England after all that time, but until a few days ago, there wasn’t. Nor were there any plans for one, even though a £1,000,000 was spent celebrating Brown’s birthday last year.
Enter my wife, Laury Dizengremel, sculptor.
Well, watch the video to see what happened. But the purpose of the video was not to simply document the making of the statue and it’s ribbon cutting on the Thames River in London last week. Rather it was to market the sculptor. And you probably wouldn’t think that when you watch it.
This brings me to something mentioned in an earlier post when I referred to a new chapter for the print release of the Run ‘n Gun Videography book (which, sorry, I haven’t gotten around to doing yet. The chapter, yes. The update, not yet).
The Chapter is called Marketing Viewpoint.
It’s simple. In order to market effectively you have to assume the viewpoint of the eventual target audience.
In this case, it’s a rather small audience–people who want a bronze statue made.
So, if you can remember, when you watch the video, try to assume the viewpoint of someone shopping for a sculptor to make a bronze statue that costs anywhere from $40,000 to $90,000 and up. That’s not money spent lightly. One has to do one’s homework.
Tell me what you’d think as that prospective statue buyer after you watch the video. Would you contact her?
In related news…
The other by-product of my trip to China is this video of Laury telling the story of how that whole ‘China Connection’ thing came about years ago…
The Video Whisperer 
Hi Jon,
I think I would get that Laury has the following attributes:
a) that she is capable of making fantastic statues and sculptures
b) that she has great energy for making any project complete successfully
c) that she would be unforgettable to work with
d) that she could make something happen, even if the project didn’t have a backer or patron at the start
The only parts of the video that I felt would be worth a second thought were:
1) 0:43 Man saying how she had run ahead of permissions and funding giving him sleepless nights (but the following line is very powerful)
2) 2:00 Duchess on screen talking with lower third but with voiceover from Laury continuing (maybe a more non-verbal shot like with her and Alan Titchmarsh).
I enjoyed the video and wish you both well.
best regards,
Carey
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Thanks Carey, One number one, right–it set up the punchline. On number two, good point.
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