Focusing at the brand marketing and advertising sectors, Bems has partnered with NeoMedia Technologies to distribute 2D barcode solutions throughout Latin America.

Soul Sampa creates fresh, customized “urban experiences” related to sustainability in terms of design, fashion, street art and music.

It’s no secret that we are all suffering from information overload. How much of this information we can actually process effectively is a great question, yet another point worth noting is the negative impact that recurring bad news can have on mental well-being.
Concerned with this phenomenon, a group of young entrepreneurs in Brazil decided to follow the steps of GNN (Good News Network) and many others worldwide and inject some positive vibes into the Brazilian digital news feed. And so AsBoasNovas (The Good News) came to life.
AsBoasNovas goes beyond aggregating news from other channels – it has its own news [...]

Probably the most prominent name among Brazilian architects today, Isay Weinfeld, is transforming São Paulo – one building at a time.
A son of Polish immigrants, Weinfeld was born and raised in the city that now hosts most of his world-acclaimed projects, such as the Fasano Hotel and the 360o Building, which has recently received the MIPIM Architecture Review Future Project Award for best residential and overall project. Famous for his contemporary style, he believes that architecture must cause some emotion, whether it’s fear, comfort or even a big laugh. His projects are not about the monumental dimensions that made Oscar [...]

Diller Scofidio + Renfro, an interdisciplinary architectural firm based in New York, was recently awarded the winning design for the new Museum of Image and Sound in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  The museum will be situated on Rio’s famous Copacabana Beach and use the iconic boulevard as inspiration for the exposed walkways up the facade of the building.

The designers, who were behind New York’s High Line, hope to capture the idea of a public in motion and include them in the range of galleries, entertainment and educational spaces available inside the building.  The museum includes a piano bar, a restaurant, [...]

On Monday, 13th of July, some landmarks of the city of São Paulo were decorated with giant letters that spelled words such as “Descanse” (Rest), “Relaxe” (Relax) and “Calma” (Slow Down). The purpose of this artistic intervention, created by the Coletivo BijaRi, was to encourage some reflection in the midst of the urban chaos that is São Paulo and offer a feeling of peace and tranquility to the population. But on the very next day, the Mayor of the city had the words removed alleging it was not an artistic intervention, but subliminal advertisement and therefore against the law. The [...]

At first sight, it looks like an ordinary bus. The difference is only noticed when it comes nearer and one hears no sound, and doesn´t see the usual black smoke coming from the exhaust pipe. Latin America´s first hydrogen powered public transport bus took the streets of São Paulo on July 1st. The project has been under development since 2004 and is the result of different partnerships, including with the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and UNDP Brazil.
The hydrogen bus will be tested during two months before being incorporated into the regular fleet. The goal is to have 4 hydrogen buses [...]

Creative Social points us to a campaign run by MasOportunidades.com, an Argentinian e-commerce website that is a great example of a challenger brand as made popular by Adam Morgan. Challenger brands are brands that are not necessarily market leaders but have the ambition to get there, making best use of their limited resources – an analogy often used is that of David vs. Goliath. MasOportunidades.com acknowledged that Mercado Libre (eBay’s Latin American partner) was way ahead of them, but slowly and steadily embarked on a campaign to wrest them of their lead.
Challenger brands have a range of strategies including targeting [...]

Brazilian art is experiencing a period of solid growth in the international scene, both in terms of presence and reputation. The best example of this recent exposure is in the street art world, where Brazil has been represented worldwide by names like osgemeos and Nunca. But to show that Brazilian art is more than that, the Dutch city of Rotterdam is currently hosting a series of events focused on different aspects of Brazilian contemporary art production.
Three exhibitions in three different museums take the visitor on a journey across art, architecture, visual culture and design. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen exhibits art [...]

Wooster Collective points us to this street-art piece installed in São Paulo by Raphael. The artist has covered a dumpster with colorful flowers made from old cans.

Formed in 1996 by architects and artists, BijaRi is a collective focused on visual arts and multimedia creation. Through the use of different resources and technologies, and both analog and digital media, they propose artistic experimentations that attempt to challenge the way we think about our surroundings and the relation between humans and the urban environment in which we live in. Urban interventions, video art, performances, design and web design are the mediums used to provoke such reflections.
Their latest intervention took place on Paulista Avenue, one of the city´s busiest streets, which is often compared to New York’s 5th Avenue [...]

Pele Verde (Green Skin) is a branded content project developed by digital advertisement agency age./ISOBAR for Banco do Planeta (Bank of the Planet), an initiative that brings together all the socio-environmental actions of the bank Bradesco.
The preservation of the Amazon is on everybody’s mind, but what does that mean to the peoples of the forest? Pele Verde is a native-generated documentary: ribeirinhos (people who live on the margins of rivers), caboclos (those with mixed Brazilian Indigenous and European descent who generally-speaking live in the forest) and other forest peoples were given the challenge of showing the rest of the world [...]

The government of Rio de Janeiro, has determined that walls be built around 13 slums located within the city. The building of the first one, surrounding the Dona Marta slum, has already begun. This is a theme that has been discussed in Rio de Janeiro since 2004, but what has changed since then is the reasoning behind the discussion. When announced in 2004, the walls were allegedly going to be an attempt to prevent the violence of the slums from spilling over to the rest of the city. The government´s proposal was considered a violation of human rights and a [...]

Tony Moxham and Mauricio Paniagua are the creative heads behind DFCasa, a Mexican-based design studio reworking the traditional styles and techniques of Mexican crafts into contemporary home furnishings.  Moxham, an Australian art director / journalist, and Guatemalan painter Paniagua first met whilst living in New York.  Working with local Mexican artisans, DFCasa creates products from a range of materials including aluminium, hand-blown glass, traditionally-cast ceramics, silver and fur.
The sculptures pictured above were inspired by the traditional hand-applied beading of the Huichol, an indigenous ethnic group of western central Mexico.
[via Lost at E Minor]

From the financial crisis to the environmental one, there is no doubt that the world is experiencing a period of drastic changes. While most of the countries are devising their policies based on green considerations, Brazil seems to be going in the opposite direction. The government has recently approved a 10-year plan for the Brazilian energy matrix that not only ignores renewable and clean energy sources where hydroelectric plants are not feasible, but also favors the increase of thermal plants based on coal and oil.
In a speech made in the south of Brazil shortly after the approval of the plan, [...]