PROJECT N:OW

The Opportunity

When I took responsibility for PROJECT at MAGIC, the brand had history and recognition, but parts of the market had moved on. Streetwear and contemporary culture were changing quickly, new communities and media platforms were shaping the industry, and the traditional trade show model wasn't enough to bring them back.

I didn't think the answer was sitting in a conference room trying to decide what the market wanted. We needed to go into the market and ask.

That meant spending time with brands, retailers, media companies, influencers, and people shaping culture to understand why they had disengaged and what would make PROJECT relevant to them again.

What We Built

Those conversations became the foundation for PROJECT N:OW, an initiative designed to bring new energy, ideas, brands, content, and community back into the business.

We developed partnerships with WGSN, Highsnobiety, GQ, and other influential organizations while introducing new programming, activations, buyer initiatives, education, and experiences around the show.

The goal wasn't to throw away what PROJECT had been. It was to understand what made the brand important in the first place and reinterpret that for where the market was going.

It was one of my first opportunities inside a large organization to apply the entrepreneurial approach I had learned building Project Ethos to an established business with history, customers, and expectations of its own.

The Legacy

PROJECT N:OW reinforced something that has stayed with me ever since: established businesses can reinvent themselves, but only if they're willing to listen.

You can't manufacture cultural relevance from inside an organization. You have to stay close enough to the market to understand what's changing, respect what made the business successful in the first place, and then be willing to try something new.

That lesson continues to influence how I approach transformation today.