Furniture brand Swoon unveils new, “living” identity

Zag has rebranded online furniture retailer Swoon Editions, creating a set of “living” brand guidelines that can be adapted depending on current trends in interior design.

The UK-based retailer was founded in 2012, and works with craftspeople and makers all over the world. Instead of developing its collections in the typical 18-month design cycles, it uses data to respond to customer demands and trends and launches new designs on its site daily.

Consultancy Zag, part of advertising agency BBH, was commissioned to develop a new identity, brand positioning and website for Swoon. The rebrand follows a £15 million round of investment for the company in 2017.

Zag started by carrying out research into the company and its customer base, identifying the typical Swoon customer as “hip and humble”, says the consultancy.

This led to the new brand positioning “for the home obsessed”, adds Zag, and a reimagined logo that aims to reflect the “individuality and distinctiveness” of both Swoon’s customers and its furniture.

The new marque has been designed in collaboration with typographer Rick Banks from type foundry F37, and sees each character in Swoon’s name reference different furniture design details and manufacturing processes.

For instance, the “N” nods to the joinery seen in a chair and the “W” refers to bent steel. “Individually the letters have their own character but they come together like furniture in a room set,” says Zag.

The consultancy has also developed a set of brand guidelines for Swoon, called The Living Sketchbook. The system will be applied across print and digital applications, and will see the design and colour palette change seasonally to reflect interiors trends more widely.

“The design system is about trying to capture the energy, activity and excitement of creating your home,” says Zag creative director Neil Cummings. “It’s a process that doesn’t have a timeline, it involves many points of reference and your ideas are constantly evolving with every piece you buy, so the whole brand is about obsessively putting things together until you find something that makes you ‘swoon’.”

To coincide with the rebrand, Swoon is launching a series of pop-up stores in cities across the UK this year, including Birmingham and London. It also recently launched a concession in department store Debenham’s Westfield White City retail space in West London.