Garden of George Hotel, Hamburg, 8am. The first sign that the day wasn’t going to go well. Very picturesque, but I had to get from Hamburg to London to give a presentation later that day and the hotel receptionist had just told me that Hamburg airport was shut because of the snow. To make matters worse, the internet was down, so I couldn’t even email the debrief and present it over the phone, which is what multinational clients often want. But this was a local client, who didn’t like the thought of that anyway. The weather meant that most of the clients couldn’t make the few short miles from home to their office for the meeting either, but that made no difference: we were persona non grata for not getting there and we haven’t worked with them again. The trials and tribulations of agency life! Actually, for exactly that reason we have a policy of not having a meeting on the same day as we are travelling, but sometimes that just isn’t practical.

The Palace Hotel, New York, USA. I shouldn’t have had time to take this, but as my contact arrived three hours late I had all the time in the world.

Malaga, Spain. A very nice place. Presenting at an annual conference we present at most years. It’s usually great fun but this year I was working on a pitch at the same time and so spent most of my time stuck in the hotel working while James gadded the night away with old friends from previous years. We won the pitch though.

The Glasshouse, Vienna. We were in Vienna presenting at a conference. I don’t think we made ourselves popular with the organisers as we held a party for the delegates in the Glasshouse. The organisers were holding a sponsors drinks at the same time elsewhere and most of the sponsors came to our event and not theirs. (We haven’t been invited back!)

Zurich. We’ve been here many times. A very nice city and scene of one of the most hilarious business trips I’ve ever been on!

We’ve never worked in Iceland actually. Never even set foot on Icelandic soil. You can find out how we came to receive this message HERE

Bucharest, Romania. Los Angeles is known as the City of Angels. Bucharest should be known as the City of Cables.

Place Vendome, Paris. We come to Paris for several things, most recently working on identifying the target audience and proposition for a new children’s museum of air and space.

Berlin. We presented at the Communicating The Museum conference 2016 there.

The Dancing House, Prague, designed by Frank Gehry. There’s a great restaurant on the roof with views over Prague.

Rodeo Drive, Beverly Hills, living up to it’s stereotype. Beverly Hills also has some very elegant areas indeed though. One of the most amusing moments of my career took place during a meeting at my hotel in Beverly Hills. That story is HERE

Kiev, Ukraine.I feel very sorry for it’s citizen’s.

Heathrow, T5, at it’s best. A place I see a lot of, but don’t much like. Completely characterless despite all it’s premium shops.

No rest for the wicked, Romania. In a hotel room in Bucharest, planning the schedule for the project in the US I was on my way to next. I took this because my colleagues think I spend my time lounging around expensive restaurants when I’m away. It will do nothing to dissuade them: they’ll say I fabricated it whilst lounging around in an expensive restaurant.

Berlin. Scene of a conference presentation of ours.

Rome, can’t recall exactly where. I’m very glad one of our clients has a regional office here.

Bratislava, Slovakia. Probably the smallest capital city I’ve ever been to.

Bucharest, Romania. Seeing if an ad developed for an established brand leader elsewhere could work as a launch ad for the brand here. A small project but a very complicated, stimulating one.

Berlin, a conference presentation.

Shanghai town. In some respects the world’s major cities are becoming very similar places: this could easily be one of the rawer districts of London or New York. But in other respects I’m glad to say that they are still worlds apart.

10 Corso Como, Milan. Discreetly famous, and arguably the most discerning lifestyle store in the world? Half way between my hotel and my meeting.

Harvard Business School, Boston. I haven’t been to Boston for a while, but it is a very cultured American city. Americans I know say one can quickly tire of it’s conservatism though.

New York. View from my room at the Hotel on Rivington, Lower East Side. The view is considerably better than the hotel. Quite how it is rated as one of the most desirable hotels in the world, beats me.

Brussels. It was a surprise to find myself taking this picture as I wasn’t supposed to be here. I left a sun drenched Los Angeles to arrive many hours later in a snowbound Europe. Heathrow was shut so we were delivered to Brussels instead. Thanks go to my Amex travel service and the concierge at the Amigo Hotel (from where this picture was taken) for sorting out the mess and no thanks go to American Airlines for one of the worst service experiences I’ve ever known. (Nevertheless, and because of all that turmoil, in one respect that extraordinary journey changed my life for the better…but that’s another story!)

Madrid Old Town. When thinking about Spanish cities, Madrid rarely gets a mention. Barcelona always, Seville sometimes, but apart from the Prado, Madrid receives an undeservedly small amount of attention. In fact it is a very elegant Mediterranean city.

Charles Bridge, Prague. A city I have spent many happy months in. Rather remarkably I was once suspected of being a terrorist here! My own fault.

Doges Palace and St Marks Square, Venice. Taken from a vaporetto on my way to the curious island of San Servelo to present at a conference. The conference was fine. The night out with some Scandinavian delegates afterwards was much better though. So good that they missed the last vaporetto back to their hotel…which was on another island!

Cambridge. And not a punt or a college in sight!

A very unusual place to be working, at a very unusual time of day: the grounds of Chiswick House, just as the sun was coming up.

Gt Peter St Hotel, Manchester, UK. We were here discussing beer. Good hotel. Good subject. No hardship. James disapproves of the pink chairs.

Hotel du Petit Moulin, Paris. An area of my room in this Christian Lacroix designed, excellent, eccentric hotel. But it was less eccentric than the respondents I met. Quite how I’m going to make sense of what they had to say, I’m not sure.

Another flight. Dark, raining. An all too familiar scene.

Shanghai Harbour. A place of international contrasts.

Neuer Zollhof, designed by Frank Gehry, Dusseldorf, Germany. One of the country’s many underrated cities. I spend a surprising amount of time here: generating insight, testing concepts, evaluating scripts.

Prestonfield House, Edinburgh. In some respects striking (the decor). In others a pastiche (the kilts everywhere). We spent time in Edinburgh working with a very enjoyable client.

Condessa DF Hotel, Mexico City. The roof terrace of the nicest hotel in Mexico City. One of the few good things about this threatening city.

The Palace Hotel, New York, USA. I shouldn’t have had time to take this, but as my contact arrived three hours late I had all the time in the world.

Bratislava, Slovakia. Enjoyably, one of the best ways of getting there is to fly to Vienna and sail down the Danube on one of the boats in the foreground. We were here for a meeting with the General Manager of Nestle Slovakia, a very entertaining Frenchman.

Via Garibaldi, Venice. There isn’t much left of working Venice but what there is, is around Via Garibaldi. This is a local restaurant with a great reputation.

Yountville, Napa Valley. Well you can’t work all the time, can you? A day off after working in San Francisco.

Vienna, Oct 16. I spent a week working here, unexpectedly from 8am to 11pm every day. Not quite the ‘no pressure’ time I had expected!

SantaCon, Central Park, New York, USA. I’d never heard of this before I came across it. Tens of thousands of people dress up as Santa and go on a pub crawl. Now he’s seen this, I predict that James, one of my business partners, will form a London SantaCon.

Getty Center, Los Angeles, USA. I was in LA seeing wealthy art collectors. One of them described the Getty Center as the modern day Olympus. He was right. Thanks to my client for giving me the opportunity to go there.

Donetsk, Ukraine. The Donbas Palace Hotel. I wonder what it looks like now? A very sad situation.

Canal St Martin, Paris. I was meeting a client in the culturally historic Hotel du Nord, to the left in this picture. Due to a wifi problem I found myself giving a presentation on my phone! All went well though.

The Avalon, South Beach, Miami. I was here working on the global rebranding of a Private Bank. Miami and private banking couldn’t appear more different, but underneath they’re not so different after all!

The shopping center in Malibu, California, USA. Almost indistinguishable from Birmingham’s Bull Ring?

High Road House. Not such a long journey: early in the morning working in the Chiswick branch of Soho House, a few minutes walk from my own house.

An entertaining week working in Vienna, and staying in the enjoyable Hotel Grand Ferdinand, above.

Philadelphia, USA. It’s strange how time gets used on international projects: fourteen hours flying and three days away from home for a thirty minute meeting. Worth it though. But sadly Philadelphia isn’t America’s most interesting city.

L’Hotel, St Germain, Paris. One of the world’s most refined hotels, and where Oscar Wilde died. It’s cultural and aesthetic associations live on. I was in Paris evaluating advertising concepts. Quite straightforward. Unlike the Eurostar journey home. The journey wasn’t cultural or aesthetic either. It was hilarious in one respect and very disappointing in another. You can find out more about that journey of conflicting emotions HERE

Red Square, Moscow. I’ve been here lots of times, but it still impresses me. That’s not to say the rest of Moscow does. There’s a constant sense of being close to trouble. And usually you are: I once arranged for a cab to collect me from a viewing facility late at night. A cab was outside and they said, yes, they were there to collect me. They weren’t. The correct driver saw what was happening and approached. The opportunist dealt with matters by locking me in his cab whilst getting out to argue with the driver I had booked. They shouted at each other and pushed each other about a bit while I scrambled out of the cab window and made my escape. What a ridiculous state of affairs. Some of the restaurants are great though. And it’s much better than Ukraine.

Amsterdam. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve been here. The last time was presenting at a Unilever conference. Picturesque and calming in some respects. Seedy in others. (Amsterdam, not the Unilever conference.)

The old Bay Bridge, San Francisco, USA, just before it closed. I finally arrived in San Francisco, despite an unexpected diversion to Iceland! See the ‘Welcome to Iceland’ picture for that story.

Soho House Berlin. The scene of our drinks party for our clients at the CTM conference, 2016.

El Retiro Park, Madrid. February. It was pouring with rain and cold in London when I took this, and the day before my client and I had lunch outside it was so warm. On informing my colleagues of my circumstances one replied “You’re not making many friends around here”

Donetsk Art Museum. I fear it looks very different now. Donetsk was a very depressing city when I was there. It is far, far worse now. I am very sorry for it’s citizens.