In response to Bruce Nussbaum's post the other day over at BusinessWeek, asking if New York was becoming the new hub of design and innovation, Ross Popoff-Walker has a much more articulate and better reasoned reply to Nussbaum than our own. In it, he argues that yes, there might be lots of firms moving to NY or opening satelitte offices, but it's important to distinguish between the different types of design and innovation (i.e. it isn't just advertising) and how essentially academic areas are, and how those aren't moving anywhere anytime soon. Here's a bit:

It's no secret recipe that innovation comes from areas with strong academic environments -- learning hubs like Boston (MIT's Media Lab, Harvard), Pittsburgh (Carneige Mellon U and the Entertainment Technology Center), or Chicago (Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology).

In fact, Pittsburgh is a great case study -- Google opened up an office there because of the rich talent coming from Carnegie Mellon.

So yes, something is brewing in NYC -- the ad/marketing industry is undergoing a transformational shift to a design-focus -- and NYC has always been a hub for advertising.

Quarterly design review Eye has changed hands, according to FOLIO and a release by Haymarket Media Group. The global media company has passed ownership of the magazine to its editor, John L. Walters. "Following discussions, both parties agreed that Eye's niche-market readers would be better served by a smaller, design-oriented company," Haymarket said in its press release -- although we're not sure how to take that "niche market" bit coming from a company that publishes such magazines as .32 (the magazine of the America's Cup) and Practical Motorhome. Meanwhile, Eye is now managed by Eye Magazine Ltd, a new company established by Walters with Simon Esterson, Eye's art director, and Hannah Tyson, business director at Esterson Associates. Both Esterson and Tyson were involved in Eye's 1990 launch.

Apparently everyone in the board room thinks what Ray Brunner, Design Within Reach's CEO, is doing with the company, as they've just extended his contract out for another five years. With branching out internationally and finally turning the business around by doing the unexpected and even making money for a change, it sounds like things are beginning to click around there after the various troubles from the past couple of years. Here's a bit about the new deal:

Brunner's annual salary in the deal is $375,000, with an annual bonus target of 100 percent of his salary.

The San Francisco company hired Brunner as president and CEO in May 2006. Design Within Reach expects sales of $200 million for 2008, and it expects earnings of 3 cents to 5 cents a share.

Meant to post this the other day, but something must have side-tracked us along the way (as you know, we are all but helpless when we see shiny things). It's the news of what's finally to take over the old CBGB space in NY. Turns out, it isn't going to be completely erased and redeveloped as a Bank of America branch, which is what usually happens when property becomes available. Instead, the bar is going to become a John Varvatos store and the CB gallery is being bought out by the Morrison Hotel Galley, which sells music-related art prints. Both openings will, of course, be far nicer than CBGB ever was, but will likely retain just as many tourists. Here's a bit:

...the Morrison Hotel Gallery, which sells fine-art prints of classic rock photographs, will open a location in that space on March 27, with a plan to preserve some of the original, grungy GBGB decor, including bathroom graffiti and fliers that had been buried in an inner wall. The work of Steve Joester, who chronicled 1970s British punks, will be the first exhibition.

And if you're needing more, here's going back to our 2006 visitation to the shuttered club.

Well, if you'd ever needed a reason to not trust us when it comes to making any financial decisions for you, consider this it. After numerous reports of retailer Design Within Reach getting into more and more trouble with their money over the past couple of years, you might recall that we questioned their recent opening of a new store in Toronto, right in the thick of a housing market crisis and big-time financial turmoil. But apparently enough people are convinced that the company is finally turning things around, as it's been announced that they actually made money, beyond even the estimates they'd put in place, in their recent fourth-quarter earnings statements. We can't tell you what exactly it is that's making the turn (other than maybe it was, after all, a smart move to get the heck out of the US right now and open a shop in Canada, so at least you'd have one place open where the dollar isn't dying a slow death).

First came the "masstige" trend, which sent the wares of Isaac Mizrahi, Karl Lagerfeld, and Vera Wang to the aisles of Target, H&M, and Kohl's, respectively. But now things are just getting downright strange: avowed non-athlete Scarlett Johansson designed a collection for Reebok; Wal-Mart has just signed up Norma Kamali; and, having featured Gorbachev in recent ads, Louis Vuitton is welcoming a new pitchman in craggy rocker Keith Richards. But for us, nothing beats the news that private equity titans are kicking the tires over at Roberto Cavalli, as the house prepares to sell a minority stake to fund international growth. The Carlyle Group, Blackstone, Cinven, and Permira are reportedly in the hunt, but we're rooting for Carlyle--not because they were recently edged out of acquiring Valentino, but because we treasure the thought of David Rubenstein paying a visit to some cheetah print-laden palazzo for a tete-a-tete with Cavalli (over a few drinks enhanced with the house vodka, of course).

Luckily we work in a very nice place during the day, because otherwise it would be difficult coming into the office after a long night at a bar watching election returns. We understand that some of you might not be so fortunate, having to suffer through not just a hangover, but an uncomfortable place to work on top of a hangover. If you're in the UK, now might not be a bad idea to start looking around with the help of The Sunday Times' "Best 100 Small Companies to Work For." If you're in the business of building, you'd be particularly interested in seeing that The Architects' Journal got a hold of the list and compared it to years prior, seeing who is nicer and who is not as nice as before. Here's a bit:

Assael Architecture powered up the paper's 'Best 100 Small Companies to Work For' league, reaching number 22 in the chart -- meaning the practice is 19 places nicer than last year, but not as nice as in 2006, when the firm came an impressive seventh.

Even so, the practice is streets ahead of any other architectural outfit in the hit parade, which was won by the contented folk at charity Christians Against Poverty.

Speaking of MoMA's "Design and the Elastic Mind" exhibition, one of the featured designers just sealed a rather mind-blowing deal. In a move that may or may not foreshadow the mainstream acceptance of footwear that robotically adjusts to ambient conditions (Go-go, Gadget sneakers!), Hussein Chalayan has been named creative director of Puma, which is owned by French retail conglomerate (and Gucci parent) Pinault-Printemps-Redoute (PPR). Puma has also acquired a majority stake in Chalayan's London-based fashion business (the photo at right is from his spring 2008 collection--this season, it's all about lasers).

continued...

We're still flummoxed by the decision of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia (MSLO) to shutter Blueprint while keeping Body+Soul afloat (we think the mag has yet to shake that free-healthfood-store-periodical feel), but thanks to today's MSLO earnings conference call, we know what the company will be doing with the money that would have been spent on Blueprint (which brought in $7 million of revenue last year). It's going toward weddings and Emeril Lagasse. Bridal Bam!

"When we reported last quarter our closure of Blueprint, we said we directed some of that investment into the expansion of our weddings franchise," said MSLO president and CEO Susan Lyne on today's call. The company has invested in WeddingWire, acquiring a 40% stake in the online wedding planning company and entering a agreement related to software, content, and media sales. MSLO also announced today that it will pay $50 million for chef Emeril Lagasse's brand empire, excluding his restaurants and foundation-related assets. Beyond the cookbooks and television programming, the deal seems a particularly good fit on the merchandising side. Emeril has a line of food products (Martha's own recently premiered at Costco) and oodles of licensed kitchen products, including Wedgwood tableware, which Martha rolled out at Macy's late last year. Lyne reported today that Martha's Wedgwood line is going gangbusters, noting that the china is at "almost the number one slot in Macy's bridal registry." Can you feel the synergies?

Getty Images, which is very actively looking for a buyer, is having no luck attracting bids that top its $1.6 billion market cap. According to The New York Times, private equity firms Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, Bain Capital, and Providence Equity Partners have all expressed interest in the company, but none are willing to pony up more than $1.6 billion.

Getty announced late last month that its revenue for 2007 was up 6% over the previous year to $857.6 million and forecast 2008 revenue of approximately $900 million. But as the company explores "strategic alternatives," new, lower-cost competitors continue to enter the image market. For example, last fall saw the launch of PhotoShelter, an open but edited catalogue of images from professional and amateur photographers that are available for instant, online rights-managed or royalty-free purchase. Almost half a million images have already been submitted to PhotoShelter.

Elsewhere in business news, we got really excited about a tip that a company called DesignArt Networks has just closed on a round of venture funding. Turns out it's not really our kind of design or art. The company describes itself as a "fabless semiconductor company providing System-on-Chip solutions for the mobile WiMAX network infrastructure." Well, good luck with that!