Mbuga at his stall. Photos | Edgar R. Batte
A house can be any other shelter but a beautiful one delivers an artistic expression.
Tonie Mbuga prides in putting together ideas that easily and uniquely capture audiences.
The Kenyan-born events manager put together this year’s winning stall at the Pearl of Africa Tourism Expo (POATE) held at Speke Resort Munyonyo.
Mbuga created and built the stall of Buganda Heritage & Tourism Board (BHTB), which he conceptualised, thanks to his curious creativity and liaison with the board’s chief executive officer, Albert Kasozi. The Kenyan’s creative process is inspired by the hunger to discover, then design and execute.
His work at Buganda's stall was a showcase of tradition meeting modernity at the nexus of culture, heritage, tourism and sustainability.
The stall uniquely stood out due to a combination of elements coming together in a fusion of authenticity, architecture of unique and sustainable design and the ambience that illuminated warmth and attention to detail.
When it was set and ready, Kasozi beamed with pride because the stall not only strongly exhibited the heritage of Buganda Kingdom but also dovetailed with the theme of the expo, which was Responsible Tourism.
It interpreted and integrated the sustainability theme in every facet of the design process.
To Mbuga, it was another stamp of approval achieved. Above all, he also attained his vision and appreciation of heritage.
“It denotes the assets—physical, intellectual, abstract, bequeathed down hereditary lines for the ultimate preservation, betterment, education and elevation of a people’s culture. A people’s North Star or point of reference,” he told Saturday Monitor.
He says a major point of reference in putting together the winning stall was the Kasubi Tombs and the history contained therein.
This served to act both as the North Star of the Buganda people’s cultural norms as well as executed the transient role it plays in the future of the kingdom.
A labour of love
Despite the short time of 10 days to deliver, Mbuga planned adequately and engaged manpower to pull off the assignment.
Mbuga with client
It was a labour of love that eventually gave birth to a sense of pride, fulfilment and history.
The graduate of business administration from University of Nairobi adds:“Installation was a big headache owing to the fact that we were not allowed to work onsite, which meant scaling and re-scaling based on site provisions. We had to make the stand in such a way that it was a dismantled-able portion. Even with that it was an overnight process to install the stand and be ready to go.”
Having figured out the design elements, Mbuga’s next step was to distil these into work packets, which in turn determined the kind of materials he wanted.
The work packets involved a collaborative process which was broken down in six key pillars to aid in the ease of sourcing relevant materials, namely brand discovery or unique identity, audience experience with befitting props, furniture, fittings and flooring then immersive experience that meant incorporating interactive elements and multimedia.
Space planning, lead generation, product or services showcasing, lighting, painting, decor and props were the other pillars. To attain and actualise these, he had to have a lot of creative manpower, and more precisely a multi-disciplinary team of 25 people.
Under his company called Beacons Events Management East Africa (EA), Mbuga has also exercised his creativity on projects that include Renewable Energy 23, a Uganda Manufacturers Association (UMA) trade show, British High Commission Trade summit, MTN GLG, Young Achievers Awards (YAA), among others.
“My life’s work is summed into four ethos: Serve-service to others is service to self-purpose, Secure-securing the environment gives meaning to life, Serenity-pathway to fulfilment, Simplicity-life is not simple so why complicate it further.”
Mbuga is exceptionally detail-oriented, organised and results-driven, with 19 years of experience in successfully coordinating, managing and executing high level meetings and events.
His breakthrough
Having been in the event organising space for some time crafting bespoke event solutions to discerning clients, he got invited to participate and showcase his services at an expo in Nairobi. That heralded his entry into the world of brand experience.
Mbuga was allocated space at the event then billed as a marketing platform to help small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and other businesses expose their products and services.
He was flabbergasted by the level of organisation and lack of consistency in the booths provided. After a rather unsatisfactory and unpleasant experience, Mbuga quickly discerned it was going to be a brand catastrophe from a marketing perspective; the organised chaos meant that brand identities were being choked.
He narrates: “People found you only because you told them you were exhibiting and, as such, they knew you would be there. Right after this experience I resolved to change that and I set about figuring out how best to solve this conundrum from a corporate perspective, clients wanting to have their brand identity stand out or stay put during expos and hence address one of their key marketing objectives being visibility.”
Well, it was not an easy odyssey. He hadn’t contemplated the fact that corporate companies tend to have lots of gatekeepers who, at times, feel/felt comfortable with people they know even when it’s a novel concept, and hardly would they give another person or entity a chance.
Leap of faith
In the event of a chance come-a-calling they often would do anything to knock you down a peg or two. Thus, in 2017 the journey of combining the visual aesthetics capabilities of a design studio with brand, marketing, and communications began.
Baby step by baby step, Mbuga started selling concepts to friends exhibiting hoping they would hook.
It has led up to this moment. He made the initial approach after doing research on past exhibitors of POATE.
He subsequently created a white and black list. The white list represented the ‘promising’ and the black list the ‘probable’, and that therefore dictated his approach strategy.
Buganda Heritage & Tourism Board was in his ‘promising’ list.
He reached out and was given an audience. He received an oral brief from which he further distilled into its core building blocks, the DNA—so as to understand the issues.
Through re-interpretation of it, he developed a detailed rationale and brief to guide as the roadmap. In his mind, the concept or architecture had to incorporate elements that tell a brand story that bursts forth with vitality.
The plan was to fuse modern aesthetics with traditional influences so as to transform a simple stand into a cornucopia of artistic, visual experiential touch points, inspired by the rich tapestry of Buganda’s heritage, and weaving in elements that pay homage to the kingdom’s zest for life, culture, and enterprise, all of which profile its vibrant socio-economic landscape.
Mbuga adds: “Having understood this background, I felt the design should evoke certain basic sensations, for instance, the sensation of tradition, and the warmth of its subjects. It was also essential that it be cloaked with the promise of a sensory journey with every look, touch, feel.”
The stand design process had to be fascinated with and explore elements like colour, form, and cultural symbolism, imbued in the intricate tapestry of Buganda folklore, culture, heritage and tourism destinations, and tease out all these intertwining factors so as to tell a story of tradition meeting modernity.
