BrandNova Retail·2025·London, UK
A full rebrand for a homeware retailer
The rebrand that made Nova searchable by name, not by product.
The rebrand that made Nova searchable by name, not by product.
“For the first time in a decade, twelve store managers are all speaking the same visual language — without me being in the room.”
— Founder, Nova Retail
Nova Retail is one of the fastest-growing independent homeware brands in the heart of London, but by early 2025 the identity that had carried it from a single Shoreditch shop to twelve UK stores was quietly holding it back. As a UK-based creative studio with roots on two continents, Echo & Ember was brought in for a full brand identity system — not a logo refresh, not a coat of paint, but a rebrand that could survive twelve storefronts, three wholesale channels, and every touchpoint in between. The founder-drawn wordmark was beautiful in its original context. Scaled down to a 24-pixel Instagram avatar or stretched across a delivery van, it fell apart. Our first move was to protect what was working — the name, the tone in-store, the customer-service voice — and rebuild everything that wasn't. We rewrote positioning from 'affordable homeware' to 'homeware that lasts a decade', a shift that unlocked a new price ceiling and a serious editorial photography direction. The wordmark was redrawn as an assertive geometric sans, paired with a Fraunces-style editorial serif for long-form communication. A monochrome secondary palette gave twelve store managers a system they could actually use without needing a designer on speed dial. Every deliverable — signage, tote bags, wholesale trade sheets, e-commerce templates, packaging inserts — came out of one guideline document. The 68-page book went to every store manager and wholesale partner within a fortnight of sign-off, and the roll-out across all twelve UK stores completed in six weeks. Direct traffic climbed 38% in the first quarter post-launch, wholesale re-adopted the identity across trade collateral, and the retail team reported the shortest onboarding time for new staff in five years. The brand finally explained itself — and that, more than any one asset, is what a rebrand from a serious London creative studio is supposed to do.
Nova's founder-drawn wordmark held together in-store but fell apart everywhere else — a hand-lettered mark that couldn't survive a 24pt Instagram bio, a delivery van, or a co-branded pallet card. Twelve stores were shipping visually inconsistent collateral, and the wholesale team had stopped using the logo entirely.
We treated the rebrand as a system, not a logo swap. Naming stayed, but positioning shifted from 'affordable homeware' to 'homeware that lasts a decade'. The wordmark was redrawn with an editorial serif companion, a monochrome secondary palette, and a photography direction shot exclusively in natural light. A 68-page guideline document went to every store manager and wholesale partner within a fortnight of sign-off.
Direct traffic climbed 38% in the first quarter post-launch as the brand became searchable by name instead of by product. Wholesale re-adopted the identity across trade collateral, and the retail team reported the shortest onboarding time for new staff in five years — the brand finally explained itself.
