Issue #021

Welcome to your weekly dose of TOO x TOO – Featuring Kobe Bryant's 'Dear Basketball', LEGO - House of Dots, H&M's Conscious Collection and The Rough Guide to Xbox.

A homage to Kobe Bryant

A week ago, the star of basketball Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter crash that killed him and his daughter among nine people. Internationally recognised for his sporting ability, Bryant’s death was mourned globally. 

In 2015, however, he showed the world his creative side, with a short movie written and narrated by Kobe himself.  The animated movie focuses on Bryant reading his poem “Dear Basketball” to announce his retirement from basketball. The movie was directed and animated by the former Disney animator Glen Keane. 

As a homage to Kobe Bryant’s death, we wanted to share this piece of creative work as an inspiration to creatives and sports lovers alike.  

LEGO special temporary house

Lego has sparked some fun and excitement in the new Coal Drops Yard area of Kings Cross with its temporary HOUSE OF DOTS — a 3-day installation to introduce the new 2D tile play concept LEGO® DOTS that will be released on March. 

HOUSE OF DOTS, made of more than eight shipping containers painted in vibrant colours, included five rooms comprising of a bedroom, a living room, a bathroom and a DOTS DISCO room, where everything, from furniture to rugs, floor and walls were customised by artist Camille Walala, and a kitchen decorated with her lively patterns under the support of 180 children from Kings Cross Academy.  

In the immersive experiential space, visitors were invited to celebrate self-expression and creativity by playing and building their own patterns and bracelets that they could take home. 

H&M latest Conscious collection

H&M is moving forward in its mission to sell only sustainably-sourced or 100% recycled materials by 2030. Since 2010 it has created about ten Conscious collections, and the last one, recently released, is specifically designed for female dancers.  

The Head of Womenswear Design at H&M said that female empowerment was a key influencer to create the collection. “When designing this collection, we envisioned a fashionable girl in a dance studio dancing like nobody’s watching. We wanted to capture the sense of freedom and strength”. 

The 28-piece Conscious sports collection designed for every genre of dance is made of practical and sustainable materials, in particular, recycled polyester and polyamide and BCI-grade (Better Cotton Initiative) cotton. It is ready to purchase online and in some H&M stores. 

A guide for game travellers 

Xbox and ad agency McCann London have worked collaboratively to provide a travel guide for virtual adventurers. The Rough Guide to Xbox is aimed at encouraging games to explore destinations in the Xbox games outside of the ordinary game play. 

It resembles a country travel guide; however, it features virtual gaming locations rather than real cities or attractions. Users can find locations from games such as Forza Horizon 4, Halo 5: Guardians, and Assassins Creed. 

The photos of the locations have been taken by professional in-game photographers – and they are stunning. Creative director of McCann London says that “Some of the ancient ruins, national monuments and natural wonders in Xbox games are every bit as goosebump-y, bucket list-y, and worth seeking out as those in the real world”.  

The guide will be available to purchase from the 5^th of February and the profits will go to SpecialEffect, a charity that works to make gaming more accessible to people with disabilities.