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On Friday, June 26, CreativeMornings Makati will hold its debut breakfast lecture at A Space Manila on Legazpi Street in Makati. This is the first CreativeMornings (CM) session to be held in our shores, with Carlos Celdran speaking on the theme of “Revolution.” We’re only too happy to know the popular free lecture is finally here.
A little backgrounder: In 2008, popular design blogger Swiss Miss, aka Tina Roth Eisenberg in real life, started CreativeMornings in New York. It was borne out of her desire for an accessible event for the city’s creative community.
The idea is simple: people discuss things of interest over coffee and breakfast on one Friday of the month. Everything is for free.
Soon, it spiraled out to having themes and speakers, onto different cities around the world, earning a reputation as “the Ted Talk for the rest of us.”
After seven long years, CM has finally made its way to Metro Manila, by way of Makati, and we have graphic designer Patch Silva to thank. “I’ve been reading Swiss Miss since she started and saw CreativeMornings grow organically from a side project to a full-blown creative platform,” she tells Coconuts Manila over email. “During a short stay in New York in 2012, I made sure to catch as much CM talks as I could.”
After arriving back home, Silva found herself looking for inspiration. She started talking about those CM lectures she was able to attend in New York with some of her friends. “I found some like-minded people in my little city were searching for the same thing.”
She tells us more about CreativeMornings and bringing the popular tete-a-tete here.
Finally! CreativeMornings in Metro Manila!
During my short stay in New York, I attended numerous lectures, shows and classes spanning different disciplines that informed my work as a graphic designer. That shifted me a little bit in an irreparable way. It was important for me and my discipline to keep my eyes open and learn something about the world around me — through architecture, fashion, performance, art, music, etc.
Touch down Manila and I continued my work. But then I found myself searching for inspiration or creative kinfolk. I started talking about CreativeMornings with some friends and found some like-minded people in my little city [of Makati] who were also searching for the same thing.
Were you able to attend CM talks while there?
Yes! I attended a couple of CreativeMornings talks at the original location, NYC! I caught the talk on food, where the speaker was Emilie Baltz, a photographer/artist/performer who took us through her works that integrated all her disciplines through tactile performance dining, and a cook book she photographed and produced.
The other talk I caught was by Lucianne Walkowicz, an astrophysicist and multimedia artist. She enraptured the audience with her curiosity of life beyond earth by working with data from NASA’s Kepler Mission. Both speakers were incredibly inspiring and shattered my perception of what a “creative” life could be.
What was even more astounding was that the platform brought an impressive roster of (dream) speakers and a slew of creative professionals from all over the city to together, interact, inspire, and make connections both at the physical space and even online.
Was it difficult to get CreativeMornings to Manila? How was the application process like?
CreativeMornings is a non-profit global franchise and platform dedicated to sharing ideas to an enormous and growing network of creative (and non-creative) professionals. The application process was relatively easy but took a lot of commitment to complete.
The CreativeMornings Makati team
Okay, what can people expect from CM?
A typical talk would go like this:
8:30am: doors and open. You can sign in and grab some breakfast.
9am: Listen to the talk
9:25am: Q&A
9:35am: mix and mingle
10am: go to work!
CM is open to everyone, but is there a particular market that you’re doing this for?
The name casts a wide net from creative professionals and creative enthusiasts. That would include non-traditional ‘creative’ practitioners that come up with creative solutions and processes. Ultimately, we want to attract an audience that is willing to get up real early to learn a little something once a month.
What do you hope will happen to Metro Manila’s bustling community of creative types now that CM is here?
I was really just creative community, a space where I can hear about/from interesting people, people I looked up to, a space where I could listen and discuss ideas of what people are doing or not doing just yet. I can only hope that our speakers and events allow people to shift their perspectives a little bit each time and make their own connections.
The theme for this month is Revolution and Carlos Celdran is your speaker. Who else are your dream speakers?
I would love to hear from Dan Matutina, Maria Ressa and Dr. Jacquiline Romero! We’d also love to hear who our CM community’s dream speakers are!
Finally, why Makati?
I live and work in Makati. This was something I wanted to do for my neighborhood, but anyone is welcome to put up a chapter in their own cities.
CreativeMornings Makati happens on the last Friday of every month. Register to attend the first CreativeMornings Makati event here.
8:30am. A Space Manila 110 Legazpi Street, Makati. Free
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