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- [00:00]
Caroline Hopkinson
Foreign. The idea of actually sharing bread and getting together into the real room is such a kind of hyper real moment of our existence as well, where we perceive certain flavors. We can't escape from it because obviously screen based interactions are very clinical. I have a lot of agency about how I am perceived. I can feel, put the light on, I can modulate the sound, the microphone. But food is really real and you can't escape that sense of reality. And I think that of experienced, lived reality. There's no VR for food. Food doesn't exist in the metaverse and AI can't actually explain taste and flavor to us. And I think that's going to be more and more the intimate of having meals together. And I think even how brands are now interacting with the consumer is through those bespoke dining experiences or dinners where they put them together.
- [01:09]
Radim Malinec
Welcome to the Daring Creativity Podcast, a show about daring to forever explore creativity that isn't about chasing shiny perfection. It's about showing up with all your doubts and imperfections and making them count. It's about becoming more of who you already are. My name is Radim Malinec. I'm a designer, author, and eternally curious human being. I am talking to a broad range of guests who share their stories of small actions that sparked lifetime discoveries, taking one step towards the thing that made them feel most alive. Let me begin this episode with a Are you ready to discover what happens when you dare to create? Today, I'm speaking with Caroline Hopkinson, food artist, food anthropologist, and a person who will permanently change how you think about every meal you've ever eaten. Caroline's journey took her from studying multidisciplinary arts to building a practice that sits at the intersection of neuroscience, performance and sensory design. Over 20 years, she has moved between advertising, immersive dining and radical wellness, always using food as the entry point to shift how people perceive themselves and the world around them. In this conversation, Caroline explores why food is our last act of radical agency in an algorithm controlled world. How sound physically changes the taste of what we eat and why we surrender not control is the gateway to the most extraordinary experiences. It's my pleasure to share with you my conversation with Caroline Hopkinson. Hey Caroline. Welcome to Daring Creativity. How are you doing today?
- [03:00]
Caroline Hopkinson
I'm very well. Thank you so much for having me.
- [03:02]
Radim Malinec
You're most welcome. For the record, you and I have met very briefly at one of my supper clubs with lots of amazing creative leaders. And this is for the record, I don't know too much about you. I've got no questions. Prepared. But I'm curious, and the reason why you're here is because you do food art and anthropology. You do work with sensory objects so close to our hearts and minds and not taste buds. So I'm hoping that we can join dots and find out who's Caroline Hopkinson. What do you do? How do you do it? So please introduce yourself.
- [03:35]
Caroline Hopkinson
It's beautiful to start off with a blank slate. I am a food artist and food anthropologist. I love the way that food. Obviously, as you mentioned, we met during one of your supper clubs where you believe breaking bread is a really great way to bond with people, to get right through there. But obviously, eating is our most intimate ritual. It's the most intimate way we interact with our environment, with other people. And for millennia, we shared meals. And we have anchored memory, community, and meaning with it. And especially now that it's a world shaped by algos algorithms, we still choose what passes our lips. So I would say it's our last bastion of radical agency. Because if you give me content, visual content, there's such an onslaught of visual content. But I can close my eyes, I can avert, I can click and block other things. But food is one thing that I have absolute agency about the idea of. We get really frustrated and angered when you say, this is how you prepare the food from your hometown. And people get really revved up, no, this is not the right way. And I quite like that. I like the passion there. But actually, what passes our lips is incredibly intimate. It's more intimate than sex. Because unless we become pregnant, food stays with us. On a metaphysical level, you can see that I had a coffee eight months ago on the strand of my hair. And I think it's interesting that when it comes to time and intentionality in our world now, it's full of intention. When it comes to spirituality retreats, the way that we put food into our body, it's the ultimate marker of intentionality. So I think that's really powerful in that way. Yeah, I think for me, food is. There's a tangible reality around us, and we're living this double life of everything that's on our insta feed, on our news feed, online. But actually, food really anchors us in the present. It's very much like the stuff that's around us. It forces us to be present in there. And the idea of shaping us and sharing bread with other people, sharing a meal is the ultimate bonding thing of being present together in the room where we traditionally put our knives down, we put our weapons to the side and that's why when you go to restaurant, you have this really annoyingly blunt knives. And even if you order steak, they have to make a big, like, song and dance and bring you a sharp knife. Because that's the one time where we are together and we come together in peace or intentionality of peace.
- [05:59]
Radim Malinec
Yes, Caroline, I can literally, for my lack of questions, I can literally just take everything you've said and make a whole hour of our conversation about this. Because the way you bring together food as a ritual, as a performance and social commentary, I think you find yourself in this unique spot where you see it from such a different perspective. Because what I love what you said, you said it. There's intentionality of what we put into our bodies. My first intrigue was like, do we really intentionally put things into our bodies or is it just convenience? Is it just a pattern? Because you talk about a food being cooked by people from your. Let's say, from the hometown. And they are very proud about how they make it. And any other version of it, it's not quite right. So how did you. How do we trace it back to you being born in Cologne and now finding yourself in England working across all of this?
- [06:49]
Caroline Hopkinson
I was drawn to London to study at Central St. Martin's because I really like the idea of multidisciplinary art. So I went to St. Martin's really loved everything to do with choreography and spectacle and creating performance based art. I like the ephemeral of food that you create this meal and then it's just gone. And the idea that it doesn't stay. And then working a lot with rituals, I realize I use the word ritual and it's overused. What are habits? What are rituals? And what I'm really into with working as well with neuroscience. But the idea, where does anthropology come in and food anthropology, because it shapes who we are and the habits, how we eat, because the meals we prepare are the punctuation of our lives. They're the question marks, they're the commas, they're the exclamation marks. The idea that every time we celebrate a moment, food is the anchoring point. And that's something that I find really beautiful. Obviously, if you have the intentionality of a dinner, of coming together during a dining experience, or how brands launch themselves is through a dinner. It's an influencer dinner. It's even visually like food is the ultimate luxuries. Like the idea of we're gone away from material goods and tangible goods into experiences. But these experiences are obviously very random and Very easily retraceable. But the food and the dinner is very much that's us here in the here and now. And it can't be repeated. We've all had this. You have the same food, the same dinner, but different people. And it's a completely different vibe. And I think that's a really powerful thing. The idea of what just happened on a different night. And sometimes it's just magic. But there are all these components which I really like and I think we are, that's what ultimately makes us human. And it's away from algorithms and AI because it's the idea of it's our perception that changes us. Like the only reason I know that I'm there is the way I perceive my surroundings in there. We take the world in from our surroundings and our brains are categorizing and building a picture, but the inner picture is highly super valuable. That's a variable. It's like your reality is different to mine. But when we have food, it brings us on the same level and it's really democratic because we both eat the same thing. So we can almost relate towards different things like the idea of our culture. And perception is the only way we can drive the story. It's almost like I experience therefore I am. And I think that's a really important part of experiences because that's ultimately where the world is going. And it's like we curate and we need experiences in order to justify our whole experience and to get away from this onslaught of different algorithm pushed content which is mostly visual.
- [09:31]
Radim Malinec
I'm really curious because I was going to keep us on the straight with me trying to ask more about the food anthropology because I'm sure there's lots of people looking around the room like what do you mean with food anthropology? But I'm going to take a hard left and ask you actually more about the perception because you said that at some point when we eat food, it's the leveler we got similar perception of what we're eating. But how do I taste buds differ? Because even for example, with color, like visual perception, we see color differently. There is a preset sort of average of what you might see. For example, I've realized my left eye is more saturated in my right eye, so I don't even see color through both eyes in the same way. So when it comes to eating food, from the point of neuroscience or from the sort of biological truths, how do we perceive taste and does it differ from one another? Because not everyone is the same. We have got a similar vehicle Our vessels, our bodies. But with the perception when we talk about a fact. When you mentioned the food is ultimate luxury. It's even the term of actual, not the food is ultimate luxury. Not many people would perceive it that way because they wouldn't think it that way. So can you talk about perception a little bit?
- [10:38]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think it. Yeah, it's beautiful because obviously our side is very arbitrary and obviously it's like our side vision changes and food as well as base is our own biography. But he can almost time travel through every bite we take because obviously transports us to all the other moments we had experienced the same taste. The Mosels Proust idea of dunking a madeleine into hot tea. And suddenly it transports him into a different time when he was young. It's really beautiful, but there is a lot of unilateral truth to it. It depends of because obviously our mouth has a similar size. So I can almost. Working with unusual ingredients, which It's a really beautiful project. I started with two amazing sound artists where we had an estimated consumption time. Because obviously the mouth is shaped very similar to everyone and the amount it takes to actually eat something. So if I create a soundtrack that is the estimated consumption time of a bite. For instance, if it's three minutes, I can create a beautiful soundtrack to make it last that long. And the responses of those are very unilateral. Like the idea of having a high frequency brings out sweetness. Having a low frequency brings out bitterness in food. And there's a certain universal truth to it because evolutionary how we respond to food or bitterness. Most people relate to bitterness to danger. Because bitter in nature is obviously a signifier for something that's bad for you. But when we have kids, obviously we always think or they have to learn to have a really beautiful palette. But actually kids have more taste buds than adults and that's why they wouldn't like certain things. So it's not so much of a child being a fussy eater. They just have more taste buds to detect it. So obviously it's a bit unpissy. But if you want the best whiskey taster would probably be a 10 year old child because they can actually detect all the nuances in it rather than the average. The typical person where whiskey is marketed as would be like that 60 year old guy. But actually by then your taste buds are quite diminished. So it's really interesting how that changes. But obviously that's having all of that knowledge is almost like I use that as a palette, like an artist with a palette. And using that and modulating and actually choreographing those moments. Obviously, I'm not saying that we should eat like this all the time, but they create beautiful moments where we have and share moments where we heighten our sense of perception, an awareness of how we perceive it, and it's beautiful. But obviously, it's not newfangled science. Obviously, the big world religions have used that for a long time. So when I say I create radical, immersive dining experiences, obviously the Catholic Church recreates that every Sunday when physically, you eat the body of Christ and it's like you. It's like we are queuing up towards having this communion thing. But every time you go and have a coffee from a barista, this is such an important touch point where people are waiting in line to have their coffee. And the ultimate flex in every urban environment is that people know my coffee order and they call my name, and it's Caroline, and that's for me. And then I'm waiting in line to almost receive the communion of my coffee in that way. So it's very much about how we interact within ourselves and that human connection. And most people say that actually the moment they have that coffee is the only human interaction for the entire day. Because a lot of our meetings happen online. So I think that's a really important thing. Because you think how in a world where we could all have our coffee at home, people still venture out to that one specific coffee place, and it's very hyped, and they make coffee just so this becomes like a modern communion in that way. So that's where the anthropology comes in, because it's the habits and the ritual of standing in line and the anticipations. Like, the most beautiful part is it's unnerving as well, when you're really hungry and food is just about served and you're trying to hold yourself back because the host hasn't opened the dinner yet. But we are hungry, we're salivating. We just want to tuck in. And it's a really beautiful. The anticipation moment just before dinner is gorgeous.
- [14:39]
Radim Malinec
When you say it's really beautiful, I think there's lots of hungry people going, no, no, no, no, no. It's a sugar drop. I need my food. I need my food. But what's really interesting, what you said about bitterness, because from what I know that the bitterness, there's also, like, the sign of making something feel so odd and so different that we believe it's actually, let's say it's a medicine. The reason why medicine is bitter is because we need to believe that it's doing something that's potentially also why Red Bull is so popular or so effective because it doesn't taste like a natural drink. So I think that acquired taste is something that signals I'm guessing here, but I believe it's a signals to the body. This is different than the or. We'll be back after a quick break. This episode is brought to you by Lux Coffee Company, the first creative specialty coffee company building a platform to shine the light on emerging global talent with a mission to make a positive impact on a creative industry and beyond. LAX Coffee Company offers exceptional coffee sourced from around the world through ethical and sustainable practices. You can discover the current range of signature blends and single origins coffee hardware and accessories along with exceptional apparel. @luxcofee.co.uk you can use the code podcast to get 15% off your first order.
- [16:06]
Caroline Hopkinson
But I think that's a really exciting thing, the idea of bitterness when it comes to our taste perception and realizing how you mentioned acquired taste, but it's actually, it's a lived memory where we we learned how to override the idea that bitter equals danger. And that becomes a different archetype. So it's almost you can tell that someone who likes bitter flavors is more of a thrill seeker, someone who's more of a risk taker. So you can almost profile someone who likes bitterness. It's the person who's more of a roller coaster person, someone who likes fast cars, someone who learns that at that moment of risk taking there is more to learn, like having black coffee and something rather than the Netflix and chill person who likes soft flavors, vanilla roses and pink. So there's the idea of the people pleaser. So actually our taste palettes is a very interesting insight into certain archetypes of or Jungian archetypes that exist. But you can almost get straight to it. So I can tell you about the personality of someone who actually prefers bitter flavors or has learned to override this initial very natural evolutionary stopping point.
- [17:16]
Radim Malinec
I'm loving this. Before we get to talk more about all the senses of food and experiences, I want to know a little bit more about you. Because you clearly into people, you're clearly into performance and, and food and all everything around it. And no one so eloquently ever described that impatient queue at Starbucks or any other coffee chain. To us it resembles a holy communion because I don't know who was the marketing genius who decided with Starbucks we're going to put names on our coffees. And apparently that's have earned A lot of trust and apparently that's elevated the experience. I personally dislike it. I always use a fake name. I use it as a joke because who are you? What do you want from me? I just want a coffee in peace. So it's interesting how it all works for different people. But how did you get interested and curious about food and curious about humans, ancestry of food and all of that journey? Because we put in together in my opinion, sort of inspirations and influences from different places. So how did you become you and where did it come from?
- [18:19]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think I'm fascinated by people and different patterns and the idea that food show me what you eat and your likes and your taste and you tell me who you are. And I think that's a really beautiful portal into the insight into that. Having worked in advertising as a creative director, I always thought it's really interesting how marketing towards people and is such a guessing game but actually deep diving into psychology and archetypes, there's such a. There's so many fabulous patterns where you can actually have such a beautiful insight. And I think insights and semiotics are really fascinating. And food is a really great thing because it's something we do every day. It's very personal, very intimate, but it shows so much about our personality and our lived experience, our biography and that. And I think maybe I just like deep diving into it and then using neuroscience is obviously as an information tool for that and as well decoding certain ways and patterns and behavior patterns. I find human behavior endlessly fascinating and how obviously that is used by big brands. When you mentioned coffee chains as well, whether we like it or not makes a lot of people a lot of money. And I think the idea of how we change in a different environment because obviously depending how old you are as well, it's like we know that life before social media or before screen based things, the idea of anchoring ourselves in the here and now perception is more than ever really important. The idea of what is our experience and experiencing and how do we coincide. There are different realms. There's the online realm and there's the real life realm all around us. And I think food really anchors us. It's like the idea of getting 20 people together in a room. It's always we perceive it as really magical.
- [20:04]
Radim Malinec
You and I were born in the same decade actually not too far from each other. I'm thinking when you're describing this sort of pre screen time and now with the screen time and not at the age of digital natives. When you and I were growing up. I would like to assume that the food on our table was very similar. There was not too much of a performance, there was not too much of a theater about food. It was functional, it was in some way basic and it was not trying too much. But now I would love to believe that there's so much theater about food. And is it because we were longing for it, we needed it? Is it because we know more? It's because that's the minimum viable dinner, if that makes sense. Because I think we got two polar opposites. We've got the comfort food, we got fast food, and then we've got food excellence and then something in the middle which is some consumer food and what we make at home. This is sort of me simplifying all of this, but I'm really trying to find the way, like how does the food theater come from? Is it because there's the space, there's necessity, there's curiosity, or is it all of the above combined?
- [21:05]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think it's such a kind of beautiful shorthand to get to know people as well. And nowadays we can. It's just endless videos on TikTok about what I eat in the day. And people love watching that, like they love watching food shows. The idea of the performative eating element is very much there and I think that's obviously through social media that's heightened because obviously there was nothing. Food was much more private and I think now is much more in the realm of. Of what people are eating and people are not eating as well. It's like the idea of that's a constant endless fascination. But I think that's something that has shifted a lot, I think through social media and people living out their life online. And it's very clinical. But I think when it comes down to food, suddenly it conjures up different flavors and smells, although I can't actually yet like transport that through the screen. But just almost the auto suggestion of the smell of the coffee or someone preparing food up close and the abundance of food, it's. It's very hyper personal. It's almost the way food is prepared is almost pornographic in that way. There's a certain like, glistening in your face, like abundance of the way people use food in that way. And it's very bonding and it cuts right through a clinical notion of. Because yeah, it's, it's. Food is obviously multisensory. It has a smell, it has a sound, it has a taste. And obviously that gives as well rise to countless ASMR videos of people chewing food. Something that's been for millennia perceived as embarrassing and disgusting is suddenly seen as someone preparing food. And the minute detail of sound captured by people are chewing or eating and preparing food or something. Yeah, it's again very intimate and there's an intimacy. I think it's almost a counter trend to the loneliness epidemic of people are sharing those moments. Because when you spend most of the time on that realm of the, the online realm where we feel like we're bonding with complete strangers. And the majority of people I see, I have more screen time with people I follow online than actual real friends. But these are strangers to my life. But I know what they eat. They sharing their lives with me. And depending on like how unhinged I am, I wouldn't say I spent so much time on there. I see them more than my closest friends, but I have such intimate details of their life, how they prepare, how they take their coffee, whether they're going through things. But I think that's a shorthand and people are that's as well used and abused by different brands in order to create that really close bond.
- [23:35]
Radim Malinec
You said that the preparation of food is almost pornographic, but I think pornography, the term could be almost pursued as not real. But to you what you described it. Again, we talked about perceptions. You described as almost this vulgar, in your face, intimate experience rather than when we got food. Porn is more like this is the stuff you might never make because it's out of your realm. Your food's never going to be this good looking or whatever. So in that perception, and you talk about the amsr, a lot has changed the more of it on show. And you were talking about this in your answer. I was thinking how many seasons of Chef's Table I've watched and how many of Knife Edge episodes I've watched and all of those things back. What really fascinates me is that person who would go across the tallest mountain just to find the right leaf or parsley, how they would go and just get the right ingredient. And they say, look, I haven't seen my kids in six months because I'm trying to get this restaurant going. I'm thinking, I guess, suppose someone has to do it. There might be real people screwing at the screen going why would you do that? And then there'll be other people like, oh, well done, I understand you because we got two different perceptions. Again, how are these people so into their craft? I want to say obsessed, but obsession is one part of food. How would you give it so much? Because ultimately it's in the service. Of others because they could have easily done something for themselves differently.
- [24:56]
Caroline Hopkinson
I find that passion. But I would say it's obviously it's greed that makes us go. And if you think about Spanish people in the Spanish Armada going over and trying to go towards Americas which not 100% knowing that the earth might fall off. But obviously they didn't go just to conquer new land. They were literally driven by greed because someone showed them pictures of possible coffee and exotic fruits. And again, greed is what gets us to go to China because these guys have noodles there, they have rice, it's delicious, let's go. And these were people who would leave their families behind not even knowing that the earth is round. And that was always. I think humanity and mankind has always been driven by this greed of conquering new land. But the reason we go towards different places and people were trying to make this incredible vast sea voyages was because there were different. The promise of a pineapple, the promise of bringing back foods that we don't have and yeah, sugar and sweetness. And I think that's definitely something that makes the world go round. And I think the biggest commodities is like avocado followed by banana. I mean that's what the world economy is driven by food. So I think that's fascinating and I think it's greed. But it's good treat and that gets us closer. It's like finding the ultimate conquest is always that one flavor we haven't had yet is like the newest taste is I think humans and that unites us all is that we are very greedy when it comes down to it.
- [26:26]
Radim Malinec
That's really interesting you say greed because I made a note. I said greed versus curiosity because I guess greed is not a gluttony, I suppose. But is there greed versus curiosity?
- [26:38]
Caroline Hopkinson
Greed has been portrayed negative in the Judeo Christian realm by puritans. But the idea of greed is something that's drives us forward. It's got a negative connotation, but it's just the idea of. I would say it's a gustatory curiosity is the idea of. I'm just, yeah, hunger, hunger like a good quest, hunger quest that makes us go and cross. And like you go to Paris to find the best crosser, the flakiest cross. Saw you go to New York and you go to all the coffee bars to get the best cold drip coffee. It's beautiful. But it drives humankind and it makes us do things. The Romans built vineyards and they knew that in their lifetime they wouldn't taste the wine. But it makes us build things and build vineyards for generations to come. And I think there's a beautiful sentiment towards the hunger quest, let's put it that way.
- [27:26]
Radim Malinec
You're absolutely right. Greed has got negative connotation, but so does envy. Even though envy can be positive thing, envy can be a drive because it gives you a spur of what you could be or what you can do. I want to talk about the fact how you said we can choose what we eat. We can choose, like how we curate our food and what we put into our mouths. But in a book titled Ultra Processed People, there was a quote saying that we are currently a part of a wide experiment we've got no control over, because the food manufacturers, the producers, supermarkets create food that we need to find enough food or we need to create enough food for 8 billion people. I don't want to get too deep onto upfs and that kind of stuff, but how do you find this type of food that plays with our perception and potentially gives us less choice in a busy life to eat well or to look after ourselves?
- [28:21]
Caroline Hopkinson
Yeah, I think eating well or what passes our lips is like the last bastion of radical agency. And obviously feeding all the people in the world obviously has limitations as well. And I think it has to do with intentionality. And I think the missing link is mindfulness, inattention, what we put through our lips as well. But I think there's a beautiful awareness as well when it comes down to, I think cow's milk or the production of cow's milk, People choose actively oat milk over cow's milk. Whether this is the answer or not, how we have actually agency through our food choices for environmental impact as well. So a lot of people turn vegetarian because. Not through personal taste preferences, but, but because of that, I think. And it's really interesting when it comes to anthropology, it's like the idea of traditionally we were not meant to eat meat and celebrate food every single day. There are feast days and they're fast days. And if you look at different world religions and how we lived our lives, we had lengths, we had times of fasting that is ingrained into humanity for centuries, for millennia. And now we are trying to find, I think interval fasting is if this is like the latest new trends, but it's always been imposed on us. And I think it's the idea of the hyper convenience, which started off in the 50s. I think we're seeing the end of this time as well, where food is just there. The idea of plenty and the idea of scarcity and using up every single morsel and sometimes having bigger fasting windows as well is something that is hundred years ago. Everyone would obviously agree. Of course you have a fasting window and you don't eat a big meal and a feast every single day. And it's the intentionality, the anticipation, anticipation of creating a feast. Looking forward to it as well. Looking forward to that meal and meeting people and coming together over breaking bread rather than having this very individualized eating of hyper convenience. I think hopefully we'll see an end to that as well. Obviously it's sadly it's driven by socioeconomic restrictions as well. Because obviously when I talk about intentionality, obviously it is very much, of course it is about how to make that accessible to wider mass of people rather than the chosen few who can choose to individually source their food as well. And I think there's a lot of possibility as well, because obviously those scarcities and the problems, are they becoming bigger problems as well? It's like how can we have limit food miles and there are a lot of community gardens, hydroponics, where we're growing food much more locally as well and with much more attention.
- [30:55]
Radim Malinec
You mentioned the experience of seclusion when we consume our food. Because I feel through our screens we've never been more connected to different types of food, different curiosities, potentially exercise our greed in a way of what is there where I can find and what sort of experiences can I have? But is it. The arrival of the medium has given us greater choices of where we can work, but has actually divided us more than ever because we can hide in our own spaces and still be connected through a screen, but we're losing that social contact.
- [31:28]
Caroline Hopkinson
I completely agree that we are. I think by living so much of our lives on our screen, we are creating a double life then two different realms. There's the realm of our online life and there's a real life life. And I think it's about food. It's almost like the missing anchor. It's an access that's connect the two realms as well. Because obviously there's a loneliness epidemic. Obviously I have kids, so for me sometimes we go like loneliness sounds like a really wonderful thing as well. I love, I yearn to be lonely, but obviously that's different. And a lot of people in their 20s, they work incredibly long hours on a screen. And that coffee moment I mentioned with the communion, it's one of the only human to human touch points or getting your sandwich. And I think that's the idea of actually sharing bread and getting together into the real room. It's such a kind of hyperreal moment of our existence as well, where we perceive certain flavors, we can't escape from it because obviously screen based interactions are very clinical. I have a lot of agency about how I'm perceived. I can put the light on, I can modulate the sound, the microphone. But food is really real and you can't escape that sense of reality. And I think that of experience, lived reality. There's no VR for food. Food doesn't exist in the metaverse and AI can't actually explain taste and flavor to us. And I think that's going to be more and more the intimate of having meals together. And I think even how brands are now interacting with the consumer is through those bespoke dining experiences or dinners where they put them together. And I think that's exactly why they're using it as well.
- [33:06]
Radim Malinec
That was a fantastic segue exactly to put in spotlight on what you do. Because you do work with brands, you create experiences, you curate their taste, their crunch, their smell, their flavors and this ultimate luxury. So what do you do in terms of work and how do you take a client? How do you devise an event? Can you tell us more about what you do?
- [33:28]
Caroline Hopkinson
I like to curate different dining experiences. It's not just dining experience. I think they're more immersive experiences and teaching people how to be more present and creating those boundaries as well of how we perceive what comes physically towards us and not. And I think the idea of taking food in is a really good learning experience to talk about these things. But it comes from creating high end dinners where everything is a beautiful choreography. It's again about having the control, about changing people and explaining more wonder to the world of creating beautiful bespoke soundscapes. I am working with Sony Paris where creating a dinner in September, but the next Tuesday we're going to create a sowing ritual where we are sowing all the seeds of the dinner. We're eating into rooftop garden on a rooftop in Paris. So it's very much about the intentionality. We're taking biosonification of the individual seeds. That means that there are certain electric signals every seed has. Especially a seed just before it's bursting has a lot of really powerful energy. I was working with a sound artist who created the sounds of those seeds and then we are placing them during this sonic ritual where I have a fantastic actress. So she's a personification of Gaia, of nature where she's reciting poetry, planting the seeds and then we're going to have little cameras Showing the sprouting of the seeds and then we're going to eat the very fruit on a rooftop in Paris in September. So it's very much about the intentionality of intent and awareness of seeing how that actually impacts the taste as well.
- [35:12]
Radim Malinec
It's worth saying this. It reminded me of David Byrne's book, which is titled How Music Works. And he said that music is one of the mediums that just happens at that time. Of course, that you can have a recorded music, but when the music is being played, it's just a performance of that moment there and then. And when you talk about your dinners, is that experience there and then you can't. You can take a little bit in your doggy bag and go, look what I've got. But it just stays in the room. Like you can you bring home with your experiences, your remnants of the taste. How would you prolong that experience? Or do you ever get sad that that experience has got start and finish? Because I love that you planting your seeds on a roof garden and doing this. But again, there's a gap between, like, how do you create that sense of waiting? But like, how do you feel about the experience? Because it has to finish.
- [35:59]
Caroline Hopkinson
Yeah, I think you completely hit the nail on the head then. I am completely fascinated. The idea of you have so much preparation, so much intention, and then you have the meal and then in 50 minutes it's gone. Poof. It's completely ephemeral. And for me, that is the beauty of it. So maybe there's some sort of the vanitas element of. It's that piece of music. You practice and practice and then you have one performance and that's just it. It's gone. It's time. Like music is just a timekeeper. It's just telling us this moment of time and life, music. That's why I like working with live music, because it's like life eating. You can't take that away. No picture will ever do it justice. It's just there and it's gone. And a time when we're trying to create content and we always, rather than creating memories, we just capture memories. And I think it's really important and it's so powerful just to create a memory non capture it put the phone away. So I think that's really powerful. The idea of going to a nightclub is working with Lost Nightclub here, Fabian Miguel from Secret Cinema. And it's really simple, but we all have that experience of going to nightclub without a phone and losing all your friends. But it's so powerful to Put the phone away and just get lost in the moment. You can't create, you can't have pictures. There's no content, there's no memory. It's just in us. And I think a beautiful meal is exactly. You can't capture it. It's. Yeah. Music as well. Because music and food just goes. It bypasses any rational thought. It goes straight to our souls. Like that music, that taste gets to us. We don't have to think about it. It's like we don't have to be educated about it. It's very democratic. Of course, there is so much knowledge about food. But we all taste and we all know we eat all the time. So I love that. I think it's really powerful. But yeah, it is. I love that. It's like the idea of so much intention and then it's just gone.
- [37:45]
Radim Malinec
Yeah. Because I think there must be a differences in character. Some people want this to go on forever. Some people go, okay, this. There's a hard stop and we'll see what happens. Because I think the older I get, the experiences happen in such a compressed and compact space. And then it takes me days to unpack. It just literally go, oh, that's what happened. Did you remember this bit? And you remember that bit because let's say, yes, we got to meet for my creative supper club. And for me, it was just like, how do we just bring people back in the room? And how do we create something and try, in my opinion, this uber ification of the experience. I've looked at the experience going, okay, how do we get people to enjoy themselves? How do we get people not to worry about the final build? How do we not get to worry about X, Y, Z? And trying to literally create this experience where all you have to do is to show up and have a good time and you can go home.
- [38:33]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think unpacking an experience like a dining experience or any kind of beautiful music experience is. I think that what drives communication is the best gossip. Unpacking those moments are exactly the touch point of what makes us human. What did you experience? And the change in perception, that's just like what drives gossip, what drives good chats, what drives us? Because otherwise I think it's just boring communication. But I think that's what humans. We started talking when we were sitting around a fire. People obviously told stories as well. But unpacking experience of what happened during the day when people were hunting a buffalo, that's completely it. I think it's like what happened. And just describing certain different experiences is the most beautiful way of coming together, having one good experience, and then sitting for weeks afterwards and unpacking it. It's exactly what bonds friendships together.
- [39:23]
Radim Malinec
When you speak about experiences, it made me think about the more than just one sense as of a taste. So you go, obviously you mentioned you work with sound engineers and sound artists. But then you got obviously the sense of touch, you got a sense of smell, and then you got the ambiance, obviously you got a room and other planning. So how do you create the experience that play to all senses and how do you achieve? Because I would like to believe that not everything, all the time is in your control. So how do you go around, you know, playing to all five senses?
- [39:53]
Caroline Hopkinson
Yeah, I like to control the choreography. Our perception is an intricate choreography. And I think we all know this, like between attention, memory, sensory, motor and emotion. And then it's core to who you are. And it's our reality, it's our own inner world. And we use our bodies to make sense of it. Because no two people perceived in the same way. So we obviously have the. And we have obviously driven sensors. Like sound is the fastest that cuts through it. It's like the fastest sense that gets straight to it. So sound is really powerful. And then we have obviously sight. Sight is obviously very over overwritten because there's such an onslaught of visuals as well. And then smell and food, obviously often people talk about flavor, but obviously that's an interesting interlink between taste and smells. Like the idea of when we have cinnamon and next time you have cinnamon and you close your nose, you can't taste cinnamon. Cinnamon is a flavor. It's obviously very closely linked. And the close interlink between the senses. So it's called cross modalities. Like the idea of one doesn't informs the other and everything. But all these senses are how we, how we calibrate our existence, how I perceive the world. So obviously food is beautiful because it's an intricate choreography of all those touch points, the tactics of eating something with your hands or just even weighing, putting it straight into a mouth or using different things. And I think that's really beautiful to choreograph that. Obviously it's a choreography that is used every single day. We go through this choreography. But obviously sometimes we have those feasts which you prepare more. But it's still very like different of. It's funny how universal it is. Most people eat with a fork. Like it's such a weird random food implement, but it's why are we eating with the fork? And folks all look the same and try to eat with a fork that's bamboo shaped or like wooden. It feels really disgusting. It's like there's a certain mouth feel to it and it never worked. So it's amazing how conservative we are when it comes to fruit because it is such an intricate subliminal choreography that we are used to. There's a certain moment of that as well. It's like there's a fruit, like there's a certain. Most dining tables are exactly 90 centimeters. If there's 95, it feels weird. So it's amazing how universal all of that is calibrated all over the world.
- [42:12]
Radim Malinec
How do you curate a journey for your guests, for your diners? And how do you create the highs and lows and experiences?
- [42:18]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think creating immersive experience is a lot about the onboarding as well. It's like obviously the moment the experience starts as well. When you work with brands, it's very important to say the moment you accept the invitation, the moment you send the email invitation, that's when it starts as well. So it's very much about understanding and letting people surrender towards the experience, but never breaking that moment of trust. Even if you said that's an Amos Bush, it's like, so trust is really important because obviously I'm willing to lean forward, backwards and let myself fall, but only if I know that definitely that is not there. And the moment that trust is broken when it comes to branding or experiences, then people lose that sense of trust. But I think because we are so much in control of everything, we're yearning and we have so much choice, it's very important to actually work with that surrender moment of I trust you to curate that experience for me. And people really love that. When it comes to working with a lot of retreats as well recently on Radical Wellness, people are willing to surrender a lot. And you feel really, do you gonna let me be in the sauna? Ask. Like I can ask people to be for half an hour in the sauna, but as long as the trust is not broken, as long as they know that I have a perfectly choreographed soundscape to keep them in the sauna to do this, to give them something cooling in the end, that needs to be really tight and that trust needs to be onboarded, needs to be established but never broken. And then you can get people out of their usual state. But I think that is definitely something that surrendering towards other people's creating that experience is. It's definitely a big thing. And creating that experience is where I don't have to be in control all the time because otherwise we don't get lost in our own city. Because we have obviously Google Maps. I can review every restaurant but like the idea of just create something in there. And I think one of the nicest dining experiences people sell is there something special. Fifteen years ago I created a dining experience in a Masonic Temple. But we picked people up from their home so they never knew where it was. But it's not something super secretive, but it's more like we sent taxis to them and the journey started in the taxi but they remained blind folded during the time. Fifteen years later they'd still go, oh my God, you did this dinner. I still remember it. I never knew it with that sense of disorientation and surrendering and not knowing who else was there. So the idea of anonymity as well throughout that, it's really powerful as well. I think it's because such an onslaught of information of our location. Exactly what's happening to give away so much of that tracking of everything and just to give in to something. It's beautiful. But I think food is, if you've ever had that experience, someone placing food directly into your mouth. That is something that is so incredibly awkward and intimate. But it is a really fun moment as well.
- [45:12]
Radim Malinec
I love that you leading me with these really important words to my next question because you talked about trust and that's again we talk about personal perception of like we got personal perception of trust because societal perception of trust. And so we have the same opinions about food. Not everyone loves the same, not everyone trusts the same. So when you create these experiences, you need to almost trust yourself and trust the onboarding process that the people who will show up will actually be open to surrender. Because I would like to believe, or at least that was my perception when I was young that everyone ate everything. It was not complicated diet, but it felt like there were some people who didn't like, let's say dill or something. There was that sort of school meal that everyone was like no, no, I'm not eating this. But everyone ate and it felt like it was more level. And now we've got our preferences, we've got obviously we find out more about intolerances. We find out more about what people, what they dislike, what they could eat, what they shouldn't eat, what they mustn't eat. It creates a very complex situation. And then in my opinion, when you try to create your experience for a group of people, how do you prepare yourself for individualities and individual sort of Perceptions.
- [46:24]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think it's beautiful to play with that idea of individual preferences, but I think because we are so aware that we are being manipulated all the time when it comes to content and sound and everything. So that's why I think food, as I said earlier, is the last bastion of radical agencies. Like the idea of when people say what are your food preferences? Every server now and the world has to ask you do you have any allergies? Before even giving you something like this is very much. It's almost heightened because almost I'm provoked to be hyper aware of what passes my lips. But I think food is the only thing that literally becomes us because sound comes and goes, but the phone and like sound never enters your bloodstream. Food enters my bloodstream, it becomes energy, it becomes part of me. But food forces us to be present as well. So I think the idea of personal preferences because it's the only way that we can actually have that radical agency, I can say no to what passes my lips, but I can't. Obviously we have headphones. I can have noise canceling headphones, but not hundred percent. The cacophony and the sound of the world is constantly around us and we are being bombarded by content. And we subscribe. We're paying dearly for that content. Like from Netflix, all the streaming devices. Dating is like about swiping left and center. It's all visual as well, so I think it's really interesting. But truth is, it is the last bastion of where we can define of who we are. And I can say no. It's a no towards not engaging with that. And I think obviously on the darker side that leads as well to the rise of eating disorders because of course people always had eating disorder. But the incredible rise of that is because people are saying no and being in control over over that and exerting their control over their environment.
- [48:12]
Radim Malinec
It makes me think of preconceptions of what we think eat. People don't mean, what we like, what we dislike. And sometimes it just hasn't happened in the right way. We haven't been served particular thing in a particular way that we might like it. And I give you a personal story which put in my second book, which was called the Coriander Story. And for some reason I felt coriander is not something I like. And I remember having my first poke bowl and it was the salmon, Hawaiian salmon bowl, quinoa and all of that stuff. And they basically pokeball is like a posh subway. Like would you. And you kind of create your own Ball and ask, if you want this, do you want that? And he says, oh, coriander. And somehow I said yes to coriander. So the coriander made into my food bowl, and I'm not in because I've been England at that time for about 20 years. I'm like, of course. Yeah, I'm dying on the inside. I have to eat coriander for the next 15, 20 minutes. But the recipe was fantastic. The recipe, it just worked. The flavor was part of a symphony of this dance, which worked together. And I was like, okay. It hasn't converted me, but hasn't necessarily made me dislike it anymore. It was like, okay, this belongs here. Someone actually put it in the right place. It's got its space. And I tried to then do that sort of same thing with my clients, not with Cory. Underbody idea of something that they dislike because it's. It's almost like they say they feel like they have got to disagree with something. So I would then challenge them. And when they say, I don't really like yellow, I don't really like this, I don't particularly think this is for us. I'm like, actually in the right way. Everything could be right. So I just finding new ways of, like, how do you create this concoction of ingredients that actually come together?
- [49:49]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think it's such a beautiful allegory as well. It's like breaking preconceptions is a big thing for me, and I think it's exactly that. It's. Your coriander story is about breaking preconceptions. We think we know something, but I think when it comes to perceptions and the sensory triggers and I'm working with is like the idea of I never experienced. I never perceived it as such because it's all about just perception. It's like the idea of blue can look red if you perceive it in the same way. And playing with that is just a momentary standpoint of what you have. Obviously, yeah. Coriander often tastes, to a lot of people like socks or like old socks. But I think given the right time and space, it can be different. And I think it's beautiful to have. And I love working with clients or working with people and changing the conception or the breaking the preconceptions over something. It's like the idea of, yes, actually, I don't like white wine, but actually, if you color it and you perceive it as red wine, suddenly you read it as something different. And I think there's such a beautiful, unilateral learning experience to how we Perceive and how we position ourselves in the world. And without becoming too political, it's really important to. To be more open towards it and using food as being more open towards different experiences as well.
- [51:04]
Radim Malinec
When did you realize that this could be your work, business, livelihood? When did you realize on that journey of daring creativity, to me you don't live a regular life because when you're telling me how you live, how you perceive what you create is that beautiful sort of fringe of the society you're creating things that are not always for the many, but I would like to believe inspire a lot. So when did you realize this is your business?
- [51:32]
Caroline Hopkinson
I think I realized that obviously I always wanted it to do that. I think it's like the idea of immersiveness and cross modalities and working with the senses and immersing people in an experience is something that I've been going on for 20 years now. Obviously immersion and immersive experiences, if you look on eventbrite is one of the big categories. I think I just started working in that niche and the more you work in the niche, suddenly it's not a niche, it's a mainstream thing. That's really great. But 16 years ago I was. I have a place in Berlin and I wanted to commemorate the fall of the wall. And I created half of my apartment into the eastern block of Berlin and half of it in the western block because I wanted people to feel a lot of Americans and expats and English people were there. What it felt to be living in a divided city. So I created the supper club at the time and I thought that'd be really fun. So people can't they get allocated to the eastern or the western sector? And I thought that's a really good show and tell. And then the New York Times actually picked up and they wrote an article about this. And I thought, you know what? This is not just a sapphire club. I'm doing on the side. While I'm a creative, this is what I want to be doing. I want to tell stories through food and actually using food as a entry point to change people's perception and create experiences with it rather than working with it. So I was really lucky so far that different brands or different projects allow me to do this. But I think it's as well the way that I think social media and the world changed that now we are much more onboarded towards immersive experiences and creating experiences is a completely legitimate way of living and making a living.
- [53:10]
Radim Malinec
Through your experiment in Berlin, did you get people upset about Being in East
- [53:14]
Caroline Hopkinson
Berlin or West Berlin as the tongue in sheet experiences. Actually, for the Berlin experience, I made the eastern menu more exciting because obviously, traditionally people wanted the western food, and obviously it was theirs. Girls with. With lobster and really beautiful food of the plenty. But actually then I had like. For the eastern sector, we started with Solyanka and everything. So towards the end, people want to break out. And it's really interesting. Yeah. But because again, I think it's about surrendering towards the choice. Because we are so used to having the choice, especially when you have paying customers, people will always want to be given the choice because we're so used to the choice. And it's very important about the onboarding and the communication that this is. Or if you work with different retreats or experiences, if the onboarding is right, people are completely under the understanding that I am surrendering towards your choreography. I give up my choice. So you don't understand that I can change the sector. And I'm enjoying the fact that I've been allocated to a sector because that very much that allocation is part of the experience of that lived experience to a lot of Berliners where people just drew a line and it's just random.
- [54:23]
Radim Malinec
I like that the word surrenders come back again. Because ultimately, yes, we are paying customers, but we do surrender to what's available in a way. Sometimes they make provisions and they make something off menu. Okay, I want something that you haven't got because of certain reasons or certain preferences. But yeah, you're right, Surrenders had not thought about previous conversation. And this word would be so important to what we do or what we talk about here. Because surrender is partially what is required with food. Because after you surrender again, and we talk about, for example, the words like greed or envy, like I feel surrender is positive and negative. Because you can surrender in a very positive way and go, hey, surprise me. Make me feel something.
- [55:04]
Caroline Hopkinson
But it's not giving up control. It's not giving up control. You surrender. Another clear understanding that it's trust. That's why I think surrender needs to come in with trust. So I think it's really interesting. Completely. On a side note, I. I think there's a lot of interesting learning as well. Like when there's a book about kink. And obviously surrender is used sometimes in different format. It's about trust. So people. Even when it comes to weird sexualities, then not weird sexual encounters, people have safe words. So it's very much. There's a certain boundaries in that, but sometimes, obviously, as a normal consumer, you don't think about this, but if I. I surrender towards a brand, I believe in the brand, otherwise I could just make it myself. If I go to a restaurant, if I order off the menu, I could just do it myself. That thing is weird sometimes, trying to think that we want to keep our individuality and having a big flex of ordering off menu but that defies the object of going to this beautiful restaurant and surrendering towards it. Or if I'm surrendering towards a brand, towards a cut of the jeans, that's just the way they're cut. If I'm asking them to change it, it completely becomes nonsensical towards their trust bond you create with the brand as well. But I think yeah, the word surrender is really important, but it is about onboarding and trust and appreciating that moment that you're surrendering and giving up that certain moment of hyper control. Because we are so overloaded by choice when it comes to eating and food because obviously there is so much plenty. It's actually really beautiful that to go to someone's place and having something cooked for you based on your preference because they is such a beautiful gesture. I thought you might enjoy that and I want to share that taste with you. It's a really beautiful ultimate gestures. So again it's an experience rather than a commodity of buying someone something the most expensive thing.
- [56:54]
Radim Malinec
It's beautifully said. I can only finish this conversation with a quote that's on your website which says food explains our status and identity. The table is a place where we become aware of who we are around a table. All previous meals come together in an endless succession of memories and future associations. Caroline, I'm a fan of what you do and I can't wait to in some way collaborate, have another supper club of collaboration or something. Because you made me think about so many different parallels and I hope that also works for all the listeners because what you do place to all senses and I'm excited that people like you exist because you can show us what we can do beyond the realms of possible. So thank you.
- [57:37]
Caroline Hopkinson
Thank you for having me on. Lovely to chat.
- [57:50]
Radim Malinec
Thank you for listening to this episode of Daring Creativity podcast. I'd love to know your thoughts, questions and suggestions. Question. So please get in touch via the email in the show notes or social channels. This episode was produced and presented by me, Radim Malinich. The audio production was done by Neil Mackay from 7 Million Bikes Podcast. Thank you and I hope to see you on the next episode. If you enjoyed this episode and would like more accessible resources to help you discover your daring creativity. You can pick up one of my books on themes of the mindful creativity, creative business, branding and graphic design. Every physical book purchase comes with a free digital bundle, including an ebook and audiobook to make the content accessible wherever you are and whatever you do. To get 10% off your order, visit novemberuniverse.co.uk and use the Code podcast. Have a look around and start living daringly.