Having just returned from HOW Design Conference, I have a hundred stories and many photos to share about the last five days in friendly Boston. But before I do that (and to buy me a little bit of time to get organized), let me just post this photo of a fake mustache (synthetic! Eww!) and tell you about the most important reason anyone should go to a professional conference. Not the workshops, not the inspiring talks, not the networking lunches, not the studio tours, not the vendor trade show, not exploring a new city, not even the partying.
The best reason to go to a conference like HOW is the potential that you’ll meet a very cool person who you should really know. Someone you soon discover is really rather like you—imagine that! A designer meeting a like-minded designer? At a design conference? No way!
And this has to do with a fake mustache…how? Well, here’s what happened. At the end of the first day of the conference I exchanged cards with some interesting folks—one of whom became an instant friend. It didn’t take long for our new friend to admit she had slipped into the local costume store and bought fake mustaches of all shapes and insisted we wear them out (I went with “The Rogue” obviously). Which we did of course. To the opening keynote. To dinner. To drinks. To a local jazz club. We’d have worn them all night had the sweat and laughter not caused them to eventually fall off.
Did I mention this new friend and the others in our group were girls? Yup. Two Canadian dudes wandering the streets of Boston until dawn (in search of breakfast of course) with three of the coolest mustachioed girls you’d ever meet. We looked like a bunch of freaks escaped from Barnum & Bailey.
(Gotta love the graphic design on the mustache packaging by the way. Like we need instructions to remove the staple first? Oh wait, maybe they’d analyzed their audience and knew there’d be drinking involved.)
Tags: Boston, Events, friends, HOW Design Conference, Inspiration, mustaches, Travel
