HORNBY HOBBIES | Beautiful Boy | 1999

Time with Dad runs along the rails / Hornby "Beautiful Boy"

London, 1999. Just hearing that John Lennon's "Beautiful Boy" was used in a commercial is enough to make my heart skip a beat. And when that commercial is for Hornby model railways, it hits even harder.

The idea

This Hornby ad used "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)," the song John Lennon wrote for his son Sean. Model railways are a hobby passed down across generations, and the time a father and child spend together building the track and running the trains overlaps perfectly with the world of "Beautiful Boy."

What happened

It won GOLD.

Afterthought

I couldn't find details on what the footage actually looked like or what kind of father and child appeared in it. But just imagining Lennon's gentle voice playing over a scene of a parent and child gathered around a Hornby train set is enough to warm my heart. Love and hobbies that cross generations—the simple fact that someone in London in 1999 took the care to capture that is precious enough on its own.

Awards

Cannes Lions Gold 1999

Three more the bear picked for you

A Hibernating Bear's First-Ever Christmas / JOHN LEWIS "The Bear and the Hare"

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JOHN LEWIS | The Bear and the Hare | 2015

A Hibernating Bear's First-Ever Christmas / JOHN LEWIS "The Bear and the Hare"

A bear who sleeps through winter had never once seen Christmas. So his best friend, a hare, gives him an alarm clock so he won't miss it—a story told in just two minutes.

A Decade, Seen Through a Window / Toshiba "LED 10-Year Calendar"

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東芝 | LED 10年カレンダー（あなたとLEDの10年） | 2016

A Decade, Seen Through a Window / Toshiba "LED 10-Year Calendar"

An LED bulb that lasts 10 years. How do you communicate that kind of lifespan? Toshiba chose "everyday life" over numbers. Across 3,653 days of windows, you see a family's irreplaceable daily moments play out.

In This Case, the Target Must Be the Parents / CALORIEMATE "Yume no Senaka" (The Back of Dreams)

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カロリーメイト | 夢の背中 | 2016

In This Case, the Target Must Be the Parents / CALORIEMATE "Yume no Senaka" (The Back of Dreams)

This CALORIEMATE commercial cheering on students taking entrance exams follows a year in the life of a son grinding through a second attempt at university entrance exams, from the mother's point of view—from the day he decides to repeat the year to the day of the exam itself. Niiro Murakami, who shaved off his long hair for the role, plays the son, while Misuzu Kanno plays the mother who watches over him with quiet warmth. The soundtrack features Ryota Fujimaki's own cover of Remioromen's song "March 9th."