Yabu Pushelberg: Journalism promotion

Harnessing the power of personal connections with editors

Toronto-based Yabu Pushelberg (YP) is a world-famous multidisciplinary Canadian design firm. I was happy to propose and write the big press hit, when they were a small but promising interior design boutique, that helped launch their rise to superstardom.

As Canadian correspondent for New York-based Interior Design, I gave Editor-in-Chief Stanley Abercrombie a tour of new and newsworthy projects in Toronto, including YP’s Stilife nightclub in the Entertainment District.

Knowing that Stan was working on a biography of mid-century designer George Nelson, I figured that he would love the iridescent, vinyl-covered Stilife banquettes evoking Nelson’s Marshmallow sofa. And in due course, Stilife’s Marshmallow Room graced the cover of the journal. My nine-page cover story featured Stilife and two other hot YP projects, Club Monaco and the Irish Shop. It was an auspicious debut cover story for YP in America’s premiere interiors publication.

A few months later, I gave a similar tour to Annetta Hanna, Editor of ID, another high-profile New York-based design journal. Upon entering Stillife, she said, “This is too good for Toronto; it should be in New York,” and assigned me another Stilife cover story.

Within a couple of years, YP was winning so much coverage in Interior Design and elsewhere that when I pitched a new YP project to Stan, he replied, “David, if we publish another Yabu Pushelberg story this year we’ll have to change the name of the magazine.”

David Lasker Communications

Banner photo: Pendant lamps reflected in the mirrorized ceiling at Table Rock House Restaurant, Niagara Falls, Ontario, by The Ventin Group Architects (+VG) and Johnson Chou Design, copyright © David Lasker Photography.