18. Juli 20224 Min.
Our high degree of digitisation at HCG corporate designs not only brings many advantages for our clients, but also for ourselves. Since our team works remotely and has always been based in different locations, I also moved my own office from Innsbruck to Israel for five weeks - in particular to Tel Aviv.
My office in Tel Aviv was the co-working space of Damndesign - a beautiful office with all the amenities one could wish for and wonderful colleagues. In addition to the human two-legged friends, the furry four-legged friends have also grown on me (10% of Tel Avivis are dog owners).
My special thanks go to Kreativwirtschaft Austria and Markus Haas of ADVANTAGE AUSTRIA for the great organisation.
Tel Aviv stands for high-tech, high digitisation and an incomparable start-up vibe. It was very inspiring to breathe that start-up air every day. On every corner you can see that Israel is a young country on the upswing.
Nevertheless - and I find this remarkable - it is very human. It's more anonymous in a small town in Austria than in the "big city" of Tel Aviv. The mentality could hardly be more different. Tel Aviv feels like a mixture of a large village community and an economically booming city.
I got the feeling that everyone in Tel Aviv wants to make it, a 45-hour work week (as an employee) is normal. I perceived Tel Avivis as hard-working, intelligent, cosmopolitan, very caring, but also very direct. For a Central European sometimes a bit too direct maybe. But hey, it's another culture.
CYBER WEEK
Cyber Week took place at Tel Aviv University from June 27th to 30th, 2022 - after a two-year break due to the pandemic. Here, representatives from politics, finance & investment, cyber security, energy industry and technology from all over the world came together to network and exchange ideas.
As one of only two Austrian participants, it was an inspiration to network at the highest international level and to make good new contacts.
VISITING WIX
Another reason why I chose Tel Aviv for my temporary office abroad: Wix is at home here. As you may know, we are Wix Partners and have been creating professional website designs with Wix for many years. That's why it was a special pleasure and honor to meet a part of the Wix team in person.
TYPOGRAPHIC ADVANTAGES FOR MULTI-LINGUAL DESIGN
In Israel people speak Hebrew - a beautiful and interesting script. This language has a very special advantage - it is read from right to left. Why is this an advantage? Well, integrating Hebrew and English into a single design is much easier this way.
An example:
The logo of the Bauhaus Center Tel Aviv is bilingual. Two small black squares serve as a horizontal anchor for Tel Aviv and a vertical anchor for Bauhaus. On the right, the anchor serves as a visual starting point for English (reading from left to right). On the left, the anchor serves as a visual starting point for Hebrew (reading from right to left).
As you can see, the different reading directions offer great design advantages, especially for centred designs. This is great for displaying signage, logo designs, billboards, etc. in multiple languages!
The Tel Aviv University logo also benefits from the different reading directions, too.
Here, the left half of the logo design below the logo icon is filled with the English text (reading left to right) and the right half is filled with the Hebrew text (reading right to left). Both languages meet in the middle. A nice thought!
BAUHAUS FOR CULTURAL EQUALITY IN ARCHITECTURE
Those interested in architecture may also know Tel Aviv as a Mecca for Bauhaus architecture. The White City of Tel Aviv counts the highest number of Bauhaus buildings in the world. The escape of Jews to Israel in the 1930s contributed significantly to this development. After all, a lot of functional living space had to be created at the time, which nipped potential sources of conflict in the bud.
The Bauhaus idea is rooted in creating architecture for all people - regardless of origin, religion, mentality, age, social class, social background or climate.
Usually, architecture is a visual monument to the culture and history of a region and its people. Bauhaus stands for the opposite and is intended as a pragmatic and purposeful all-round architectural solution for everyone, which should also endure in the future.
All people should feel treated equally, nobody should feel discriminated against. Status, origin, skin colour, religion, etc. are irrelevant, the focus is on providing functional architecture to let people live as well as possible. This is how Bauhaus tries to nip any potential sources of conflict between religions and mentalities in the bud. A clever move! It's always amazing what architecture is capable of.
That is why Bauhaus architecture is also called International Style - it can be used internationally. It is a no-go to turn the term Bauhaus into the term Bauhaus style. Bauhaus is not a style in that sense, but rather a philosophy.
Bauhaus is not about beautiful buildings. Bauhaus doesn't aim at that. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder anyway. However, once you understand the meaning of Bauhaus, you at least find the idea behind it very beautiful (if not the buildings).
CONCLUSION
Tel Aviv is inspiring, cosmopolitan, vibrant, innovative, welcoming - and a real culinary delight. Tel Aviv is business and a positive example of how to drive the economy forward.