Case studies

Never the same

Things have been changing at Aton, a Reykjavík-based strategic communications and design agency. For example, the company welcomed former Jones Knowles Ritchie Design Director, Siggi Odds, as Creative Director. To ring in this change in leadership, the agency decided to reimagine its own brand.

When the team began looking for a design route, they found an answer in a custom typeface designed by the agency’s own Type Designer, Hólmfríður Benediktsdóttir. A typographic direction made sense, as the identity had to be able to flex to talk about both their clients and the agency. “Most of a creative agency’s identity primarily focuses on talking about work for clients,” Odds tells us. “Sometimes it must take the back seat and let the work speak, but often we want our ideas to spark excitement, for our clients to feel driven to action by the words on the screen, and typography is a great tool to aid this experience.”

Cutting through

Vatne Møbler is a name that rings a bell for anyone interested in Norwegian furniture. The small but traditional furniture maker’s story is imbued with a rich legacy. For decades, it has been producing high-quality, evergreen furniture that’s known for its craftsmanship and use of the choicest materials. The news of the manufacturer’s shutdown inspired the launch of the furniture brand Matre. “Matre aims to carry forward this legacy and reinvigorate the Norwegian design scene by embracing the rich heritage of Vatne, breathing fresh life into their iconic pieces of the past,” says Steven Redwood, Designer at Bielke&Yang, who were invited to design the brand’s identity. “They are working closely with the original manufacturers, taking over several of the products that have been in Vatne Møbler’s collection previously and reissuing them for a modern audience.”

Yeah, you can dance here

Tschüss is a bar and an underground dance club in St. Louis, Missouri laced with a Midwestern spirit but also a healthy dose of the essence of Berlin’s industrial nightlife. This mix of the two worlds is a defining part of the club’s identity and had to be a central motif in its branding, which was led by JesseJessi. When building the brand world, Creative Director Jesse Johanning and Art Director Nick Hum traced back their memories of travelling abroad, but more specifically their experiences of clubbing in Berlin. These recollections and their insight into Midwestern nightlife made one thing quite clear to them – Tschüss’ identity had to be unpolished, gritty, and true to life.

Finding harmony in the unexpected

A pioneer in Sweden’s recruitment sector, Academic Work has gone from strength to strength over the past few years. They have not only led the country’s staffing and recruitment industry – specialising in assisting newly graduated talent to find their match with roles – but have also expanded their reach to Denmark, Norway, Finland, Switzerland, and Germany. With this expansion already in motion, their image needed to keep pace, so they turned to the Stockholm-based brand agency OKTO to bring their interdisciplinary approach to align with the expansion efforts across the European market.

An intuitive and intelligent identity

Simplicity is key in a crowded AI landscape filled with superlatives, promises, and a shopping list of ways it can fix your life. FifthRow keeps it simple and clarifies what they’re here to do – turn any consulting service into software. By leveraging Artificial Intelligence to transform data into “actionable intelligence,” they provide a faster, cheaper alternative to big-name consulting firms, saving their clients millions of dollars and hundreds of hours.

Marseille meets New York

Marseille’s APT.20 brings people together with exceptional coffee, tasty food, and delightful company. Hosting a variety of events – from tattoo pop-ups to running club meet-ups – it’s a place to catch up and enjoy quality time with friends. Speaking of ‘friends,’ “the name APT.20 is a subtle nod to Monica’s apartment in ‘Friends,’ the owners’ favourite TV show,” points out Founder & Creative Director Manon Prost, who designed the identity for the coffee shop. 

Deeply inspired by the iconic television show and the US coffee scene, the coffee shop’s owners (a young married couple), Noémie Polverini and Enzo Busonera, worked with Marseille- and London-based studio PROST WORK to build a brand identity that aligned with their vision.

A salute to the city

When Dallas-based ModestWorks and San Francisco-based Moniker were asked to design the identity for Dallas’ first professional women’s soccer team – Dallas Trinity FC – the two studios were buzzing with ideas. The team would be part of the groundbreaking USL Super League, so crafting an identity that represented the spirit and potential of the team was no small task. From the very get-go, the studios realised that something had to be different about the story they’d tell of Dallas Trinity FC – it has to speak of more than the sport, and so, they decided to focus on the essence of Dallas and its people, its combined grit, drive and potential, and let that inspiration be the north star that guided the project.

The Edit: five projects including Gandhar Vamburkar’s benched but effective look for Musichead

Mockups

“There’s nothing worse than wasting your time working on something you don’t care about.”

Matt Luckhurst, The New Company
31st January 2025

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