IF YOU find yourself cruising along in your Audi car today, listening to The Streets on your Bose stereo with a copy of The Times in your bag, decked out in Diesel clothing on your way to catch a flight for New York, then you could be the coolest person in Britain.

If you are then assigned the seat on the aircraft next to Johnny Depp, you will be in excellent company, because the mercurial Hollywood actor is pretty much the coolest person on the planet, according to a survey of the coolest brands of 2004.

Do not be disturbed, though, if a crumpled-looking bear of a man with haystack hair flumps down on the other seat next to you, papers flying and shirt tails untucked. This is Boris Johnson, Tory MP for Henley, and the only politician to make it on to the “cool list”, published today by the marketing company Superbrands.

Mr Johnson, 40, is living proof that coolness is not just about being sleek, good- looking and young. Stephen Cheliotis, the chairman of Superbrands, says that it is also about “being able to zig, when everybody else zags”, being innovative, original and true to yourself.

“People like Boris Johnson because, quite simply, there isn’t anybody else quite like him. And because he’s funny,” Mr Cheliotis said.

The survey coincides with the publication of a book called Cool BrandLeaders, which names the most cutting-edge brands of the moment.

The 63 brands featured were chosen from a list of 1,300 by experts on the Cool BrandLeaders Council, which includes leading designers, advertisers, marketing experts and journalists. From the final list they picked five brands considered to be the coolest of the cool.

The top choice of the experts was Selfridges, which has a department store in Oxford Street, as well as branches in Manchester and Birmingham.

Next are the magazine Dazed and Confused, the upmarket lingerie brand Agent Provocateur, the Hakkasan restaurant in London and Goldsmiths College art department in London.

In a separate poll of 3,000 adults commissioned to accompany the book, Diesel was named the coolest brand for clothes, while The Streets emerged as the coolest performer. Audi took pole position for making the best cars to be seen in, audio equipment specialist Bose produced the coolest technology and Stella Artois was the coolest drink.

Quentin Tarantino was named the coolest film director for his recent Kill Bill movies, while J. K. Rowling, the creator of the Harry Potter books, topped the list of authors.

New York is the world’s coolest city, just ahead of London, and the coolest business person was Sir Richard Branson, the Virgin entrepreneur. The Times compact, naturally, was the coolest newspaper.

The poll of people aged 18 to 44 from Britain’s main metropolitan areas also found that the key ingredients to being cool were style, innovation, originality, authenticity and uniqueness. The best way to become a cool brand was said to be by word of mouth, while the worst way was through celebrity endorsement.

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