Bio Jan Van Mol

Belgian Jan Van Mol has been called a concept king, a brand guru, a renaissance man, a pioneer in the creative industry by the international press. Jan started his own advertising agency in Brussels while still at school. MotuNuï, was seen as a combination of a creative hot shop and a high level service company, resulting in a loyal client base in markets such as FMCG, automotive, retail, fashion, food and media.

In 1997 he created Addictlab.com, a creative laboratory uniting thousands of creatives from all over the world, from different disciplines, publishing over 35 magazines or books, setting up exhibitions to accelerate their creative talent and specializing in out of the box collaborative processes and research.

Addictlab has become a pioneer in collective intelligence with its own Creative Chemistry concept and tools.

The lab’s consultancy department to offer innovation to governmental bodies and companies, with cultural change transformation programs, ‘fab Lab’ installations, profiling tools to create agile organizations has been

turned into a business unit called YourOwnLab.

Addictlab and Yourownlab have set up collaborative ideation processes for companies such as Nike, Thalys, Novartis, Saint Gobain, BMW, Diesel, H&M, chocolate companies, govt bodies, cities such s Rotterdam, Kortrijk or Melbourne.

When Addictlab is all about finding new ideas and Yourownlab about selling ideas, Jan created a new section in 2016 called the Addictlab Academy to share ideas.  The Academy has opened up the lab tools and activities to kids from 5 till 105, and is now attracting over 200 kids per month, with a mobile bus visiting schools, a shop and concept store in Ferney Voltaire and a full list of workhops, a home schooling program, STEAM curriculum and camps, and even birthday ‘labs’.

As the United Nations created the Sustainable Development Goals, Jan developed the SDG Impact kit, and redesigned the addictlab.com website using the SDGS as a navigation system through people, projects and research. Addictlab is now defined as one of the catalytic places in Geneva to accelerate thinking and acting about the SDGS. The Addictlab site goes live again in February 2020, colliding with Jan publishing the SDGzine, a collaborative magazine and ecosystem on the SDGs with partners such as the University of Geneva and the Geneva Tsinghua Initiative.

Jan creates the Creative Chemistry Cards, that includes all creative disciplines, but also soft skill cards, emotion cards and the SDGs, all tools to profile, educate, innovate and navigate through ideas. 

Since 2022 Jan is managing the SDG FabLab in collaboration with the University of Geneva for more teaching, machine learning and to help Master students to prototype their ideas on the SDGS.

In 2023 his site Labfiles.org  goes live, adding a repository system for schools and organisations to innovate education using project based learning, cross disciplinary courses and bottom up projects for students . 

Jan’s ideas, photography, art and design concepts have been published and exhibited in design shows, art galleries and fashion events.

Describing himself as a creative wanderer and wonderer, he is taking on branding, advertising, photography, art and product design commissions.

He moved with his wife and two kids from Belgium to Johannesburg, South Africa, and is now living on the French side of the border near Geneva.