Exclusive interview: The Robin Collective co-founders Robin Fegen and Brandy Wright

10 January 2014

The Robin Collective

The Robin Collective was founded in 2010 and is a collection of fantastic designers, chefs, entertainers, photographers, actors and writers.They have put together a menu which is exclusive to selected Holiday Inn hotels and resorts, across the UK and Germany. 

Can you tell me a bit more about The Robin Collective and how it works?

Brandy: Robin, Elspeth and I started The Robin Collective in early 2010. It wasn't an industry we had planned to get into but after creating a picnic cafe installation called Cafe du Pique Nique it worked out that we were in a great position to start a company. At the time, we had friends, family and acquaintances assisting on production for our events and projects, which was fantastic because they were all new designers, artists or architects that were looking for portfolio projects and were very talented. We decided to keep this aspect of our business [using inexperienced, new artists]. Even though we have a core working team, we take on all sorts of talent from across the board to give them recognition in industry and bring a freshness to our projects.

Robin: They also get experience in lots of different areas as our projects are really varied. Primarily we focus on experimental food and theatrics for events. For the Holiday Inn Magical Mealtimes we had around 5-10 artists working from concept to production. It's hard work but incredibly fun!

Why did you decide to work with Holiday Inn?

Brandy: We know Holiday Inn really welcomes families in their hotels and restaurants so when they approached us about a menu to make family mealtimes more fun, we thought it was an exciting new project to get involved in. Normally our events are aimed at adults [although most are family friendly] so this was an especially exciting project as we could be even more silly!

Do you all come from an arty background?

Robin: I actually come from a science background along with writing where as Brandy comes from arty, creative background.

Brandy: A lot of people that come to work or intern with us are from Oxford or Cambridge actually.

Robin: Clever arty people [laughs].

Tell me about Magical Mealtimes?

Brandy: When a child goes to Holiday Inn they get to stay and eat free and alongside that they also get to receive one of our magical mealtime boxes, each of the items corrugate into different things within the children's menu so they can even take it home and say 'don't use it on that'. You get a box of really fun things, there is a party popper that pops out herbs which is really fun, ketchup piping bags which allows children to draw with their food- all playful stuff.

How did Holiday Inn participate in Magical Mealtimes?

Brandy: Originally we approached them with around 10 different items which we then whittled down to 6 items within a box. At first we thought we were going to be using a few items, then turned into the 6 that were chosen in the end. They were chosen just on how simple they were to understand and just how they fun they all fit together.

Robin: They know what their children like at Holiday Inn and we know what we like and what other children and adults like so we put the two together. 

Do you personally think children see eating as a distraction from playing and having fun is that why you decided to combine the two?

Robin: I don't think so, it really depends as it is important to have fun as a kid where ever you are, especially at the Holiday Inn - it allows them to not get bored.

Brandy: It's a great distraction for parents as well, just that little bonus of not only having your children eat free but also providing them with Magical Mealtime tips. It also gives them a break whilst they are eating as well because the kids can interact and engage with what's in the box on there own.

How did you come up with all the different meal ideas as some are unusual?

Brandy: Some are based on what we came up with for extreme dining and 10 are edited to fit the original menu, other things are from when we sat down and made a brainstorm of what we thought children would like, when it comes to meal times. A lot of it was actually was actually sitting down with the menus that were provided from Holiday Inn to see what was already pre-existing and what would work well with what. Something like the parsley pop party popper, what would could it work with? Obviously children could make it explode onto their ice cream but ideally you would want that to go with things like the pasta, chicken fingers and the soup. We did look at the different menus items and construct it in that way as well.

Robin: We have been doing the English branches and the German ones so we looked at favourites, what the different food items were per country. We went to some of the flagship hotels for example, for Germany we made the cherry strudel to keep it traditional and in England we did a roast dinner option.

Do you think children can be quite fussy with their eating?

Brandy: I personally don't know any fussy kids, all the children in our family are good eaters and quite adventurous with their food. One of the girls on the Holiday Inn photoshoot absolutely despised ketchup so she wanted nothing to do with the ketchup piping bags, she got to draw with it which she did like but she didn't want to eat it. Kids are also visual eaters as well, they will eat stuff that is really brightly coloured and interesting. They wouldn't necessarily want to tuck into a massive lasagne dinner, they would want little offerings of individual things.

Robin: Yeah, we did the photo shoot with the children for the Holiday Inn and they were absolutely brilliant but they turned out to want to eat fruit and healthy options rather than chocolate etc. If there is any sort of narrative behind it, if they think there is a story or if you tell them that "big boys eat this" or "it's magical" they are much more interested. If they are playing with it and it's an interesting thing they enjoy eating it.

What was the lab process, was it a case of trial and error or did you work with children to test the ideas out?

Brandy: A lot of the items are classic, British, children's menu items actually. It does appeal to fussy eaters because it's not anything outrageously different.

Robin: They are still ordering what they want from the menu that is there already but we are adding things they can play with around it and again to make the mealtime pass quicker. They can order it, enjoy it and play with it.

It launched in November of last year so the project is still fresh, is it doing what it set out to do and letting the children have more fun with their food?

Brandy: We have on social media, we have some really good responses through Facebook which has been great. We’ve also had great feedback from mummy bloggers and other families who have already tried it out in our hotels.

The Robin Collective hold events, how does the team work together on them and are they successful?

Brandy: We have never had an event go wrong, there is always surprises with everything that we do. As we work in an area that is pretty much uncharted we are creating things from complete scratch. We all work together on it, one event i may be making cocktails and then the next event Robin may be doing that so it really depends. The girls that work in our office work incredibly hard on a varied amount of stuff and we have people with a background in photography and design that may be doing things like cooking food and doing all sorts of product tests, it is varied.

Robin: A lot of the stuff that we do is for the first time. We all do everything, Brandy specialising more in the design side of things so we have our specialities. We all get involved in the end and all have different roles when making something.

You have had a lot of good press as featured on your website, how does that feel as an organisation?

Brandy: Really good actually, we have never really seen or had any bad feedback in the things that we do. We do get people being sceptical about what we do like the Daily Mail readers which we expect. It is all quite humorous actually because things that could be taken in a negative way are funny to us.

Robin: We tend to aim our things to be fun - like working on the kids menu. We usually set out with an idea that is good fun.

What other things are coming up for The Robin Collective this year?

Brandy: We are restarting our biodegradable botany classic, so you can learn about edible gardening. We used to do that at the book club and we are now restarting that at drink shops too this month. We are going to be working with a couple of big name companies but i am not going to say because we are just in the process of making some more edible fun at different restaurants so that can be expected. We are kicking off our extreme gardening classes the gift certificates are being sold at Selfridge's and they are still available and also some fun festival stuff throughout the summer.

Would you work on revamping a menu into something more fun in the future?

Brandy: We already produce products to go along side promotional things so that is always welcome. We do normally do children's stuff but for adults so with the Holiday Inn it was quite a mix up working with children. It can be a bit more difficult because children are more critical than adults. If something doesn't work properly then you will hear about it from a child. You have to make sure that everything functions right when it comes to children so it was a massive learning curve with the Holiday Inn Magical Mealtimes. To be honest we would love to work with a children's menu again in the future.

Robin: Or an adult one.

Where can people go to find out more about Holiday Inn Magical Mealtimes?

Brandy: They can go to the Holiday Inn website or they can search Holiday Inn on Facebook as well which we are linked to where there are some great pictures if you scroll through. Shortly [as we are just updating our site now] there will be stuff on there about Magic Mealtimes.