(Spec) ads

UPC
Wi-fi names are just advertising spaces which internet providers don’t use. Our idea, as proposed to UPC, is to change standard wi-fi names like ‘UPC24408’ to names like ‘Blistering Fast UPC’, for all your neighbours to see. Since those same neighbour might be on UPC as well, we’ve made a list of network name to differentiate, instead of numbers, turning your wi-fi, into an ad.

Museum Booijmans van Beuningen
The museum ‘Boijmans van Beuningen’, in Rotterdam is plagued by chewing gum, sticked on the pavement around their entrance. To prevent and solve this, we plan to place an empty frame for visitors to stick their gum on. When filled, the artwork will be placed inside the museum, as a piece of art, and a gentle reminder.

Opel Ampera
80 kilometers on a single battery charge.

Calvin Klein sunglasses

Harley Davidson + Pink Ribbon

McDonald’s

Muk Shampoo

131 008 Taxi

Pets Palace

MuzyQ

Cup-a-Soup

Jamin Chocolotto
You win ‘millions’ in chocolate letters. Compete with Twitter.

 Labello

 

 

 

Latest

Searching for meadows

Searching for meadows

Our new home in the Netherlands sits in a mundane residential area full of young families like ours. The street name comes from made (‘meadow’), still referring to a field that once lay here and now survives only in the name (just how the name Shanghai refers to a river that no longer exists). And […]
August 5, 2026
Degrees of wealth

Degrees of wealth

In eight years of living in China, taxi drivers or older colleagues loved to ask, “Which is better, the Netherlands or China?”, hoping for a single insightful answer that would explain everything. And now, back as a resident in the Netherlands, people ask the mirrored version: do I miss living in China? Neither question is […]
July 11, 2026
Goodbye to Guanyin

Goodbye to Guanyin

It’s a Saturday morning, and we’re in a taxi on the way to the airport. My clothes cling to my body and already reek of sweat, and that’s even before our 12-hour flight has started. Today I woke up at 5:30 to get up early and throw away the last furniture and items we used […]
June 30, 2026
Half a Jin, Eight Liang

Half a Jin, Eight Liang

Learning Chinese, or any language, makes you more aware of language in general. And one thing that surprised me is that, despite Mandarin being so different from my mother tongue (Dutch), both languages reach for the same units when weighing things: the kilogram (公斤, gōngjīn) and the half-kilogram (斤, jīn). It’s a small thing, but […]
June 24, 2026