Academy Student Helps Bring Snow Day to San Francisco
It doesn't snow very often in San Francisco, especially in October. But recently, Academy of Art
University student Trevor Hubbard -- in collaboration with Olympic gold medalist Johnny Moseley and
others -- helped bring the ski slopes to San Francisco for a day.
When Trevor Hubbard isn't working on his classes, he works as a creative director for ICER
Sport. ICER Sport was looking for a promotional concept, and an idea arose: why not pump snow onto
one of San Francisco's busy streets and, for one afternoon, build the most out of place ski jump in
the world?
It wasn't easy, but eventually the event went off without a hitch, and ICER received some well
deserved publicity for their efforts. We spoke to Trevor about his participation in this most
extreme event:
Tell me about how you got involved in the Big Air Ski Jump event?
My friend had a ski lubricant company (which is a more effective product than ski wax) called
ICER Sport, and needed to create some buzz about his product. What could we do? The Icer Air 2005
ski jump idea was thought up by Glen Griffin, [Olympic gold-medalist skiier] Johnny Moseley, Arne
Morkemo, and myself. I took the role of creative director, but since we all grew up in San
Francisco, we collaborated to help with logistics, planning, fund-raising, obtaining permits,
battling the city, outreaching to neighbors, handling the media, and so on.
Specifically, I designed and shaped the look of ICER, all marketing, advertising, identity,
collateral, promo materials, and so on. Everyone of our team deserves credit because we're all
creative and love to think big. We never say, “No,” just "How can we make it work?"
You learn a lot about yourself when you try to bring snow to San Francisco and turn the nicest
neighborhood in San Francisco into a punked-out terrain park. I also received a crash course in
politics and all the inner-workings of money and its perks in this city.
My experience was sweat, blood, tears, time, energy, money, heartache, heartbreak, triumph,
pride, and a sense of accomplishment. Most of all, we did something that has never been done and
pledge to stay that course for the future.
What are you working on now?
I am working full-time for ICER Sport as Creative Director for ICER's next event in San
Francisco, ICER Air 2006. It will be bigger, badder, and crazier than ever.
I am also the Creative Director working on the next issue of a magazine I started with Glen
Griffin called
Inflite Magazine, which is a subculture ski and snowboard magazine that uses ICER events
as a platform to speak about art, culture, music, current events, and lifestyle issues surrounding
those sports, on and off the mountain.
I also started a creative house called GRIFFIXTHUNKIT with Glen Griffin and some other
creatives. I will be the Creative Director, but we will continue the practice of all sitting around
the office, thinking of cool stuff. The main goal will be finding ways to create buzzzzzz. We have
a small client billing, but ICER is one of the projects we work on. Currently we are developing an
identity, and branding a new beer (which hasn't come to market quite yet), a perfume, a couple of
Web-based services, and of course ICER Sport, ICER Air, and ICER Productions.
How have you enjoyed your experience at the Academy?
I like the Academy. I guess you could say that the Academy made me hungry and inspired to get
out there and do something. A lot of the things I saw from my peers in school were better than
professional work I've seen. The industry is very cutthroat, but no one sneers at hard work. If you
work hard, don’t get sucked into the rat race of business and politics, and just keep things
simple, you’re going to make it.
The Academy taught me how to keep things simple. I like Nelson Leung; he pushes you to create.
Creating ads and campaigns is one thing, but creating twenty for one client and then scrapping them
all, creating another twenty, killing those, and then another 19, and one more, and then the
twentieth is the one you go with -- that is advertising at its truest. You have to keep pushing
things out.
What are your plans for the future?
Personally I want to fly planes and ski,
a lot. I also would like to travel more.
Professionally, I am doing what I love and I want to bring more people in to share in these
experiences. The goal with GRIFFIXTHUNKIT this year is to gain credibility through excellent work.
The goal behind ICER Air 2006 is huge. We are throwing it at SBC Park, the home of the San
Francisco Giants. We're bringing in Tony Hawk's tour, and a few headliner bands. It will include a
world class big air event built from the upper deck of the stadium and it will include the world's
longest rail competition. This will be a ski and snowboard festival with one hundred sponsor tents
around the mezzanine level. The final round will be held under the lights at night, with other
surprises and perks. Basically, our plan is to throw the raddest event ever.
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