New strategical dual leadership at GRAFT Brandlab
GRAFT Brandlab, the Berlin-based agency for brand innovation and partner company of GRAFT, continues its success story of recent years with a new top-caliber dual leadership. As of April 15th, 2020, Nikolaus Hafermaas and Rico Zocher, two experienced and internationally esteemed partners, will head GRAFT Brandlab as its new managing partners. Through their strategic competence and innovative media experience, they strengthen the unique creative profile of the agency in close partnership with GRAFT architects. As a result, the Berlin-based agency significantly expands its expertise in strategic consulting services and the innovative integration of multimedia experiences into the physical environment.
Established in 2014 by the GRAFT founders Lars Krückeberg, Wolfram Putz and Thomas Willemeit together with Linda Stannieder, GRAFT Brandlab has consistently taken a holistic approach to the creation of brand experiences, and this new move represents a strategically important step in this development. Nikolaus Hafermaas and Rico Zocher plan to expand and strengthen specific service areas and to enhance and refine its strategic brand consulting profile. Through progressive brand innovation concepts and multidimensional experiences, the agency will place greater focus on enriching the interface between digital and physical brand experiences.
Together, Nikolaus Hafermaas and Rico Zocher broaden the unique profile of GRAFT Brandlab both at a management level and in its creative and conceptual profile.
Nikolaus Hafermaas is an award-winning artist, designer and professor at the renowned ArtCenter College of Design in California, whose Berlin satellite studio he continues to lead as executive director. He began his career at Triad Berlin, where he worked as CCO and principal partner.
Rico Zocher was most recently managing director at Superunion in Hamburg and has 15 years of agency experience (including various positions at MetaDesign). The economics graduate also has experience of the client side through work with Hugo Boss and Verti Insurance.
Together, they will develop forward-looking ideas for GRAFT Brandlab’s international client base. Linda Stannieder, who with an interdisciplinary team steered GRAFT Brandlab to success within a few years, is leaving the agency at her own request to pursue new professional challenges. She is confidently handing over ongoing projects, clients and employees to the new managing partners.
