Pullover : COS
Pullover : Kenzo
Pant : Sandro
Pullover : Commune de Paris
Pullover : Stephan Schneider
Pant : COS
Shoes : Common Project
Pullover : Stephan Schneider
After spending my first personal shopping day with my old pal Frédéric, on visit in Brussels, I decided to interview him about his startup Checkthis he developed 4 months ago in New York.
Frédéric della Faille is one of the most experienced Belgian web designer. Coming from the graffiti world, he is building websites and such since the nineties for various agencies. He then co-founded and managed Bureau347 during 10 years. Big product lover, he decided to quit everything -- including his sport car -- to focus all his time on Checkthis, a revolutionary publishing platform listed as one of the top 25 New York City startups to watch.
So, who are you?
I'm Frédéric della Faille, the founder and designer of Checkthis. I started to express my creativity on walls by doing graffitis in the early nineties. I was then a really bad student and very often out painting at nights.
It took me 7 years to complete 3 years before dropping out college. Then I did two years in Typography at La Cambre but that was again too academical, so I started to play with Photoshop and internet in 1996. I directly felt deeply in love with the instantaneity of updating a website in minutes, no print process, no ink, no paper, just update your HTML and upload it to your server. So I dropped out of La Cambre and found a job as web designers, then got more responsibilities and ended-up managing a team at 23 years old. I then co-founded and managed Bureau347 during 10 years, a digital communication agency in Brussels.
How did you come up with the idea of Checkthis, especially since social websites like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, etc already existed on the market?
Every day, I have quick things to share with friends and family. A new idea, a quick message, and plenty of other things that do not fit in a tweet or a status on Facebook, and that certainly don't require a blog or a full website. And it seems I'm not the only one. Jean Montevideo,a musician friend (with a big fan-base) called me more than 3 years ago to ask how to share his latest music video and some info on a nice background. Not a full website or a blog that would need updating. He just wanted to share a clean and simple page instantly on Facebook and Twitter. I realized there was no answer. No one had built it. So I created Checkthis.
Checkthis is the perfect companion of social networks. It allows
you to add more content, change the look of it, and share it with your friends or followers.
The biggest difference with Tumblr is that a blog is like a book,
every post is a page of this book while Checkthis is the best platform to share a powerful and visually effective message. Today people use Checkthis to share a party invite, to setup a quick poll, to show a creative project, or even to sell stuff -- like I did with all my belongings when leaving to New York.
How did you create the design?
The design of Checkthis is a never-ending process. When you're building a product you are never happy with how it looks and how it works. But you make it the best you can. Then you look at how people use it and interact with it (in fact, mostly where they are stuck), and you go back to your draft and design a better solution for these specific weakness you didn't thought of.
That said, I mostly try to un-design our product. Every time I succeed to remove a button, an effect or a step, I feel way better. It's not an art, it's not a science, it really is what designing is all about.
Do you consider yourself a geek?
I'm a geek and I'm not a geek. I don't know what a geek is. Are these ladies playing with their iPhone sending tweets, instagramming their food, or asking friend's advices on this or that geeks? I think most of us are geeks, and that's a huge opportunity for anyone building a consumer product.
Is there a recipe for success for Checkthis and your venture in New York City?
That said, I mostly try to un-design our product. Every time I succeed to remove a button, an effect or a step, I feel way better. It's not an art, it's not a science, it really is what designing is all about.
Do you consider yourself a geek?
I'm a geek and I'm not a geek. I don't know what a geek is. Are these ladies playing with their iPhone sending tweets, instagramming their food, or asking friend's advices on this or that geeks? I think most of us are geeks, and that's a huge opportunity for anyone building a consumer product.
Is there a recipe for success for Checkthis and your venture in New York City?
Things are going great for Checkthis. New York will allow us to go one step further in the media world by closing deals with big companies. I also have access to a bunch of super smart people that made it, people who got millions of users or sold companies for tens of millions of dollars. For example I have a CEO coach who I meet once a week, a young but extremely brilliant guy who made tons of millions and who believe so hard in what we're doing.I can't imagine that in Belgium, but I may be wrong.
New York is also super inspiring, people understand mobile. I mean everyone understand mobile there. They are out most of the nights so it's impossible to not having a smart phone and sending emails, looking at Maps, using some apps. This is exactly the kind of people who inspire us to work harder and building a valuable product that fits their busy lives. Creative people who go out, and New York is full of these.
So when will we see a Checkthis App?
Our iPhone app starts to look not too bad. It works, it's fun, we
still have some work to do but it will be out in December. I
really hope that all my Belgians friends will play with it so we can stay connected in a much more creative way that we can do now with apps like Facebook or Instagram. We'll keep you posted :-)
really hope that all my Belgians friends will play with it so we can stay connected in a much more creative way that we can do now with apps like Facebook or Instagram. We'll keep you posted :-)
Photography : Julie Calbert
Stylism/Personal shopping : Camille Valère-Gille
Thanks to "Le Delecta"
