Creativity Is Dead, Long Live Curation | Highsnobiety

Bankrupt department stores and downsized mass brands are a cautionary tale of what happens in the absence of any curation. Good news is that, unlike art galleries of old, modern culture welcomes curators of all stripes and presents endless curatorial opportunities for brands.

And so, a good starting point for any brand to think like a curator is to create your own aesthetic world instead of simply relying on your product’s aesthetic or your visual handwriting. A brand’s aesthetic world is infinite: it extends to a pair of sneakers, a piece of furniture, a playlist, and even collaborations.

Under pressure for newness, brands struggle to actually create new stuff, but by curating the old, they give it renewed meaning and purpose in consumers’ eyes.

This flips the script of brand strategy from product benefits to the story, and makes it imperative for brands to think like curators.

Curation shifts attention from products to the curatorial point of view, which is infinitely more valuable.

The role of a curator is to sort through culture and show us what we need to know and why.

When brands moved from manufacturing products to manufacturing culture, design, luxury and art, curation zoomed onto taste, aesthetics, identity and social status.

This expanded meaning of curation makes products only one of the currencies individuals and brands trade in.

Democratization of curation changed the role and value of curators in form, but not in cultural importance.