Brand creation, product design & packaging for award-winning stationery and homewares company

For more than 10 years my main focus was designing, producing and selling my own range of stationery, gift and homeware products.

Over the years, with a growing team behind me, we created a wide range of products - from calendars to bone china mugs. Perhaps our most ‘famous’ products were the Weekly Planners and Year Planners - the first of their kind and stocked in stores across the world with a loyal following of customers who returned year after year for their wall planner.

We launched our first collection at Top Drawer in 2008, over the years the range expanded and we were regularly exhibiting at trade shows (Design Junction, Pulse, Top Drawer) and picked up some lovely stockists such as Liberty, Selfridges, Urban Outfitters, Science Museum and more. We also took stands at retail shows such as Spirit of Christmas, Babyccino Shop Up, Clerkenwell Design Week and East London Design Show.

I quickly learnt the tricks to a successful stand layout, designed and produced printed materials for the shows such as folding flyers which would grab the attention of passing customers and buyers. I would make up little press packs and designed adverts to go in the show brochures.

I built an e-commerce site on Shopify and picked up some coding skills along the way. I organised and art directed photoshoots for our catalogues and worked with stylists.

In 2019 I closed this retail side of the business in order to concentrate on my graphic design clients. I sold the design rights to the stationery products and we had a closing down sale raising money for Maggie’s.

Photo Credits : Yeshen Venema