
SEWING STORIES AND WRITING CLOTHES
Sinterklaas en de Vergetelnoot
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In The Netherlands, Sinterklaas means much more than simply getting a load of presents on the night of 5th December; parents find it increasingly important to bring the magic of Sinterklaas to life and to experience it with their children. Together with Bol, we've developed a platform that helps parents do exactly that.
As for myself, Sinterklaas came early this year. Being a writer dressed up as a copywriter, one can only dream of writing something longer than 6 words. Therefore I was thrilled when Bol agreed to create an interactive story that the children can not only read, but in which they can participate themselves; along with planning the interactions and thinking of ways to use a digital platform to create magic in our physical world,
I wrote the entire story.
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"Sinterklaas en de Vergetelnoot" has become a 16 chapter - 10.000 word - story which is to be released during the last two months of 2023. Each chapter contains an interaction that equips children with the important task of helping Sinterklaas to get his memory back. full synopsis down below
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Client - Bol I Agency - Dept I Year - 2023 I Together with - Ramin Bahari - Max Kunstjes - Chris Groelle - Robin Hornman
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Synopsis
After hundreds of years of eating the same, boring "kruidnootjes", Sinterklaas has had enough. He's tired of them, and it's time for something new.
However, during some experimenting in the secret Candy Lab, something goes horribly wrong. Sinterklaas has accidentally baked a Vergetelnoot (forgetting kruidnootje) and before anyone can stop him the damage has already been done; when he tries one to have a taste, he instantly forgets who he is and what he does for a living!
To a certain extent the Pieten can take over his tasks, but there is one big problem: only Sinterklaas knows which present belongs to which child. If he doesn't get his memory back in time, 5th December can't go ahead!

Interactions
We've used everything digitally available to us to bring the story of the Vergetelnoot to life. Every chapter contains an interaction in which children need to help Sinterklaas. When his beard seems to be on fire: Quick! Blow it out!
But that's not nearly everything. The app also allows parents to send personal voice messages to their kids on behalf of Sinterklaas. Using text-to-speech and an AI-generated voice of Sinterklaas, several types of messages, such as a compliment, can be personalized and scheduled to be sent at a specific time.
© 2024 by Donja van der Stelt