I live very close to a restaurant in Los Angeles called Vespertine. It has been voted the best restaurant in LA.
I think eating there would be my personal definition of hell.
It's not actually a "restaurant" so much as an "gastronomical experience." In other words, the food doesn't look like food. It is pretentious turned up to 11. And it's roughly $500 a person.
But for others, a visit would become a once-in-a-lifetime core memory.
Though I have no interest in going there, I admire Vespertine immensely and I'm in awe of the creative achievement it is.
It takes every aspect of what it is to ridiculous extremes. The building, the music, the service, the menu, the approach — even the valet service, apparently. This is a restaurant that has it's own trailer. (Not a trailer like a vehicle — a trailer like a movie.)
So let's be inspired.
Let's take a project or idea we've been thinking about, and Vespertine-ize it. Take every aspect of the idea — down to the smallest details — and think about how it might be taken to a ridiculous, high -touch extreme.
Take this email newsletter, for instance. What if, instead of emailing it, I hand-wrote each, added personal details just for you, and messengered it over to you in a gold envelope atop a satin cushion?
You can bet it would have a 100% open rate and would get noticed and talked about.
This exercise might lead to some ridiculous places. But it might lead to some genius places, too. No matter what, it will lead to angles and approaches very few others are willing to go to — and that might be just what the idea needs.