the after hours instagram used to be a really fun time & place for me (personally). we had zero filter… which meant we weren’t afraid to show whatever was happening in the studio at any given time.

It was a mix of bts happenings, what went down in Slack (tbh it was mostly me throwing shade at Shy), printing fuck-ups, the realities of remote work. A meme for good measure. We had a whole series called Opinionated where we’d take someone’s pov/hot take and throw it out to everyone else to argue on. We shared work but we’d get people to vote on which direction we should go in. We would design posters and let people download them for free, we would do a random merch run and give it all away on Instagram. We’d spend our weekends thinking of ideas for posts, stories and series just because we thought they’d be fun to make. We were somewhat unhinged, but it was fun, it worked, and we still had plenty of work coming through the door (so something was working).

But now? I think i can go a few days without opening the studio instagram … and then when i do login im bored, uninspired and close straight back out of it. I don’t feel like posting, sharing, engaging, or being present on the platform.

Is it the content i’m seeing? typically i get to choose from a video of someone clicking their fingers and a brand appearing resolved on screen, some creator regurgitating the same culture commentary that 500 other people have reported on, or a case study which is either a) overly glossy and dull or b) a quick flashing gif of the logo with some texture, in a collage and maybe there’s a printer.

Or is it the big question of… am I just too old for the platform now? Did I age out? Is this a young persons game? Is it time to hang up my Instagram hat and call in someone younger and fresher to do the job?

i should probably also mention that I spent my entire 20s working across marketing, content & social media (also e-commerce manager but that’s a story for another day). For one of my in-house roles, I was the social media manager of an international fashion brand with over a million followers. I’ve worked in a PR agency where I was responsible for 8+ social accounts at once. I loved it. I lived and breathed it, socials has always been my thing. Which is why im finding it particularly challenging and personal that we’re not vibing with the After Hours instagram right now.

Sometimes I wonder if getting too many followers was the problem. Not in a woe is me way (i know how this sounds, stick with me), but with far more eyeballs, we became far more conscious of what we were putting out. It went from being fun, personality-driven, on-the-fly & experimental content to having to be more resolved, more polished. Instead of just posting something in real time when it happens, we actually stop and think… is this being too funny? Is this too risky? Would this deter prospective clients?

And so the safest solution and default fallback… is just… posting… work.

And thus, the cycle of boring commences. Not to mention it gets harder to justify fucking around for a day just to create something for socials when you have collaborators, clients and general studio-running tasks that actually need your attention so everything keeps moving forward.

Maybe Instagram did get boring. Maybe I did get old. maybe I am just boring and old!? Double whammy.

But I also think we started taking ourselves a little too seriously. maybe. Perhaps this is a public note and/or plea to ourselves to stop overthinking it and to start being fun again. Less serious, more experimental, more entertaining, less polished, fuck around a little more etc. etc. Basically get back to why we started the studio in the first place. To have fun. Feel free to give me your thoughts friends.

ps after writing this Substack i went and did a low budget low concept wordmark reveal and it felt like the old us and IT FELT GOOD. maybe a whinge to the universe does wonders.

That’s all from me folks.

for context / evidence / a trip down memory lane, here is a small selection of what the After Hours Instagram looked like in its less supervised years …

Welcome to Past, Present, Future, a new series from both Jas and I where we share things we’re liking, enjoying and digging from…..yes…you guessed it, the past, the present and the future. This one is mine, go check out Jas’s too! I can confirm it’s slightly funnier.

PAST: Elsa Peretti’s Halston Legacy

As a queer person who loves art, design and cultural history, I’m drawn to anything in the Studio 54, Warhol, Bianca Jagger stratosphere. So, naturally, I’m drawn to the work of Elsa Peretti.

There’s a lot to learn from Peretti’s world. It’s a great lesson in form and function meeting on equal footing, rather than one being sacrificed for the other. Functional things don’t always need to feel utilitarian.

She approached everyday objects through a fashion lens: accessories, jewellery, fragrance bottles and packaging that people want to wear, display and keep as heirlooms. Her work was sculptural, sensual and futuristic, yet somehow remains completely timeless.

Before she was a designer, she was a model. You probably know this image even if you don’t know her name , she was the Bunny Girl in Helmut Newton’s famous photograph.

Her iconic work at Halston eventually led Tiffany & Co. to hire her as their lead jewellery designer, where she went on to create some of the most recognisable pieces in the brand’s history.

WHAT AN ICON.

PRESENT: Bird Watching Clubs.

They have been circling in my peripherals recently. Bird-watching clubs keep popping up in conversations and online communities. One that particularly has my attention and that I’ll be attending in the future is McGolrick Bird Club.

To quote Usal Project’s events page, the club was started by Michael Lombardo, a former YouTube product manager whose “disillusionment with the online world inspired him to try noticing birds.”

I like that.

Birds are so weird. AI could never hallucinate this wildly. Somehow evolution arrived at puffins, humming birds, how freaky! Forever in awe of nature.

Anyway, MBC also makes the sickest merch.

FUTURE: Cannes Lions

Not much to say but I cannot wait to be in the sun sipping some Rosé and hanging with creatives. If you’re headed there hit us up, let’s grab a drink…. or a toxic amazon slushy.

Alright. We’re trying to do a new series (don’t hold me to how frequently these will come out. current rotation: ad-hoc). Every edition, we each pick three things worth sharing: one from the past, one from the present, one for the future. It might be personal, it might be a person, a brand, a campaign, a client - whatever’s got our attention at that point. This is the general gist of it. Shy has their own picks which you can read. this one’s all mine.

But first, i have been advised I need to take full responsibility for the delay in getting this out. It was meant to go out last week, but my workload was bigger than my counterpart’s, I was a bit slow to pull it all together. Anyway with that, pls let me intro you to the lore of Bonnie Cashin.

PAST: BONNIE CASHIN

Cashin is one of those fashion history figures who should be way more famous than she is. Fun fact, The New York Times ran a piece a decade ago called “The Forgotten Designer Behind Some of Fashion’s Biggest Trends.” So….. take from that what you will.

A few things she pulled off: she was one of the first designers (from the 1940s on) to define that uniquely American approach to dress we now call sportswear. She popularised layering, and got so synonymous with it that some say she actually coined the term. She brought leather and suede into high fashion. She made casual wardrobes feel chic. She designed uniforms for women in the armed forces during WWII, and later for air hostesses. She stripped shapes back to their simplest form, then brought them to life with colour, fabric, hardware, and pieces built to work across seasons and years.

One of her more famous chapters was Coach. When she got there in the early '60s, Coach was making men's leather goods. By the time she left, it had the foundations of the fashion house people know today. The women's bags, the bright dyed leathers, the playful linings, the hardware as design, so much of what people now associate with Coach started with her. The signature brass turnlock still on the bags today? Hers. She nicked the idea from the fastening on the roof of her convertible (more on this soon).

What really got me into my rabbit hole was the fact she was designing for women like they had somewhere to be. Because THEY DID! Jobs! Stairs! Cars! Lives!

These were the postwar decades, roughly the 50s and 60s, when women were moving more fully into work and public life. While most of fashion was still busy cinching, stiffening, and slowing them down, Cashin went full steam the other way. She designed for movement, utility and independence, but not in a stern, sensible way. More in way that still felt chic. Clothes you could move in, work in, travel in.

Her references were basically her own life. People often describe her work as autobiographical - she designed what she loved, what she needed, what she actually wanted to wear. Her first poncho came from a car blanket she took scissors to. Her bags had built-in pockets so your hands stayed free. She even made a skirt with a brass clasp so you could hitch it up on the stairs.

She photographed her clothes on women running, laughing, moving. One of her collections was literally called We Live as We Please. She wasn’t designing for women to sit still and be looked at. She was designing for them to get on with things. And she got it because she lived it, a working woman designing for working women, building around the realities of her own life.

Anyway. I implore you to go down the Bonnie Cashin rabbit hole properly! Look at the work. Read the people who’ve written about her better and more rigorously than I have, give the woman the attention she deserves.

PRESENT: MARK JACOBS BEAUTY

Soooooo intrigued / excited by the return of Marc Jacobs Beauty. Mixed reviews on the actual products themselves (some say they’re lacking the innovation they were once known for), but from a design angle, the creative direction is so on point. The product design, the art direction, the world building… it feels nostalgic & archival yet fresh. I’m very here for it. Best described as “the polished femininity of Daisy eau de toilette and the mischievous spirit of Heaven by Marc Jacobs” (as Vogue put it).

So cool…..

I’m still hanging out to see what Ava Nirui’s next move is after the news broke back in January that she was leaving the MJ and Heaven brands.

Kudos to the team for this. so good.

FUTURE: CANNES

We’re heading back to Cannes Lions this year. Going? Let’s hang. Have a cool event on? We make great +2s. Send me a message.

I also realise Shy has Cannes as their future post. I would like the record to show that I actually had the idea first, let the idea slip to Shy, and before you know it, my content & my copy is taken. You can see my LinkedIn post for OG posting HERE. thanks shy.

Hope you liked this very long and timely feature. Edition #2 to come at some point. Let Shy know if you didn’t enjoy it. Not me.

Earlier this week I was talking with some peers and we all landed on the same conclusion: vetting prospective clients has become significantly harder than it used to be. At one point we even joked… should we all just stick to rebrands?

Because here’s the thing (and I’ll hold your hand when I say this), I can pretty confidently tell you that almost EVERYONE has an idea for a business right now. Especially in consumer. It seems AI has made entrepreneurship feel more accessible than ever.

An idea that once took months (or even years) to come to fruition, can now look pretty “real” within a few days. The name, the business plan, the pitch deck, the distribution plan, the sales pitch, the visual world, the mockups. Even the campaign imagery if you swing that way. The front of a business has never been cheaper or faster to put together. And yet, the back of it hasn’t really changed that much at all.

Because the reality is, building a product business properly is still wildly expensive and painfully slow (and this isn’t taking into account how many new product ideas never get off the ground or fail in the first 1-2 years).

Once you factor in product development, formulation, stability testing, compliance, manufacturing minimums and logistics, that’s all before you’ve even hit the cost of a branding studio. Then once you’re with us, the branding itself is one line item in a much longer chain. There’s still the vessel it sits in, the secondary packaging, the print samples, the print minimums, the press checks, the mailers, the e-comm shoot, the campaign shoot, the launch assets, the website.

And most of this is still before you’ve hit that beautiful little “go live” button. Get your cash books out folks, cause this stuff adds up… and somehow never stops.

Which is why one of the biggest shifts for us recently has been learning to vet differently. We’re not just asking whether the idea is good. For us now, we’re really interrogating where the product actually is at. Is manufacturing locked in? Is the formulation finalized? Have you got your vessel and done stability testing? Has anyone outside the founder’s circle actually touched the thing yet? Do you have product market fit? And then the bit no one wants to talk about: how are you funding this? Are you bootstrapping? Have you raised? Do you actually have the runway to get this thing out the door and keep it alive once it’s there?

And sometimes the smartest (and kindest?) thing we can say is: you’re not ready for us yet (what do you mean, we’re turning away work!? I know. Crazy stuff).

And we’re not doing it because the idea is bad. It’s just because there’s not enough real-world information yet. There’s no demand signals, customer data… or even things like supply chain viability (we once created the most amazing brand for the most gorgeous non-alc wine… only for it to fall through in production because there was nothing in the formula to stop it from freezing, so it couldn’t be shipped in winter. rip).

Most importantly, there’s no proof that people actually want the thing outside of your deck and the Pinterest board (sorry but not sorry!).

The advice we’re now peddling? Get that money into samples, audience building, and product-validating. Get it out into the world, into people’s hands, and listen to what comes back. And then when all of that is said and done, let’s chat.

Here’s a little PSA: most of your favorite brands didn’t look the way they do now when they first launched. They got it out there, listened, iterated, and only then came to a studio like ours.

While we could just take the project, take your money, and then say good luck… it's just not our style. We're a small studio with a big belief that taking on a project is an investment beyond the invoice. It's time, energy, emotion, care, passion and heart. You get attached to the thing (we come to love your brand as if it was our own ofc). So naturally, we want to back the ones that actually have a shot at making it into the world. Even if it means saying not yet to the ones who don't.

Andddd scene. Until next time friends.

Once maybe even twice a month, I’m endeavouring to share a few of my favourite things. Think of it as a grown-up’s show & tell. Five things across Fashion, Music, Design, Art & Food. That’s it really. I’ll keep it short and sweet cause who has time right?

Sena

These guys do handmade Italian loafers… nuff said. I first came across the brand through their campaigns, which are amazing to say the least. Full of intimacy dare I say sentimentality, not to mention they feature Antoni, Walton Goggins, Olivia Rouyre & Role Model.

Personally, I’ve been eyeing off this pair called ‘The Yutori’.

Ribelle Di Mare Soundtrack

I heard Cliffdiver, the single off this soundtrack playing in Happier Grocery over the weekend (I know, I know). But when I got home and looked it up… turns out there’s more to it.

The original soundtrack was scored for the 1974 Italian film Ribelle Di Mare by legendary composer Sandro Galileo. The film however, was scrapped before it was ever finished and the soundtrack was lost along with it!!

Circa 2020, some members from Eraserhood Sound stumbled across the score and decided to release it. It’s funky, jazzy, an all-round delight.

How true is this story? I’ve tried to fact-check it. But honestly, I like the romance of believing it’s real.

Vintage illustrated version of La Petite Sirène (The Little Mermaid)

What more can I say… it’s GORGEOUS. Warm, whimsical, naïve, BEAUTIFUL.

La petite Sirène

Collaboration for collaborations sake.

I came across this collection of posters a while ago, they immediately reminded me of the posters for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. I love the tension between imagery, colour and type. The threshold vibe.

I’m not sure they exist for a specific reason, maybe a ~vibe~ collaboration between designer Mark Busch & photographer Muriel Rieben.

Copyright: Muriel Rieben & Mark Busch

MISO OATS.
I’ve been living off these bad boys. I’m declaring this my Wasian congee (my burmese dad would be quaking).

It’s oats, water, chicken stock/bone broth, soy sauce, ginger + miso. Top it with an egg and any leftover protein you’ve got lying around (I used ground beef). Oh and don’t forget herbs + chilli oil.

I might hit you with 2 of these this week, it’s NYCxDesign + Frieze soooo lot’s to talk about.

Until next time!

The last few months have been an avalanche of deadlines (a good problem to have, no complaints here).

Big projects, big deliverables, very full weeks.

But once the final files were out and things dropped to a more reasonable pace, I’d been itching to get back to the bit I like most: working on the studio.

I also have a very specific weakness: I will always put client work first.

To give myself at least a chance of doing the former when there’s a break in the latter, I keep a running list called “to-do with free time”, a holding pen for everything I don’t have time to do, but want to.

Things like: Start our TikTok. Start the Substack. Do some posts for Instagram. Update the studio decks. Redesign the website. Build out case studies.

You know the list. You probably have the list.

This was supposed to be the week I finally did something about it.

Day one. Sat at my desk. Hot coffee in hand. Laptop open, every possible starting point staring back at me.

Immediate paralysis.

First thought: start the Substack. Okay cool, so what would we actually talk about? What's the POV? What are our content pillars? Do we really need another person talking about "culture" online? We could post work... but who wants to read another case study? Which leads me back to my main point: what would people even want to read from us??

Next thought: TikTok. We've actually had client inquiries from people finding us via other people's TikToks, so the channel clearly works. We're just... not on it. Which is fine. Totally fine. No but is it fine?? What do we even post? Process? A day in the life? Do we have to speak to camera? How do we even TikTok. Someone help.

Alright. Instagram. The one we know best, the one that's always delivered. Except everyone says it's dying, so. Cool.

Fine. I can work on our studio decks. Safe, reliable, no camera required. Except the decks need new case studies… which means the case studies need to exist first… which means maybe case studies are actually the priority?

What about LinkedIn. Feels like a quick win. Except we need work to post there too. Which sends us straight back to case studies.

But we also want a new website to put those case studies on. We designed our current site back in 2021 when we were fresh in the industry game, and a few things about the studio have changed since then… so does the website come first??

By this point, the only real conclusion is the universal one:

I just need more time.

The easiest answer to reach for, especially when you finally have some.

So of course I opened a new tab and started looking at project management tools. Maybe if I automate enough admin, I'll somehow earn my own time back?

Several hours, too many browser tabs, and a few “this could change everything” Notion pages later, I did the only logical thing.

I went back to client work.

I could do it all. So I did nothing at all.

Ahhhhhhhh.

On a positive note, in my spiral of overwhelm, I came across this post on Substack:

I did some lite investigating.

According to studies, brain scans show that when you stop telling yourself “we’re doomed” and start asking a practical question, the amygdala (threat) calms down and the prefrontal cortex (planning, control, decisions) switches on.

Do that often enough and neuroplasticity does its thing: the rational pathways bulk up, the panic loop thins out, and “what’s the first step?” starts winning more often than “this is too much”.

This is now the current experiment. Less “reinvent the entire studio by Thursday.” More catching the spiral mid-sentence, swapping in “what’s the first step?”, and seeing what happens.

A free moment appeared in my calendar. Experiment time.

Step one: write this Substack post. No overthinking, straight to the page (and an agreement with myself to never re-read it once it’s live!!!). No, I don’t want your feedback.

Step two (which is considerably more humble than my ambitions would like): pick one thing from the backlog and give it 20 minutes. Outline a case study. Draft three post ideas. Dump some thoughts about the new site into yet another Notion page. Whatever. One concrete move, set against a timer. If it has legs, keep going. If not, permission granted to crawl back to the warm familiar comfort of client work.

I’m not sure how long I need to run this experiment before I see results (if you’ve cracked it, I’m all ears). But the win right now isn’t a new website or a thriving TikTok.

It’s just doing the first, smallest thing instead of nothing at all.

I’ll report back.

And yes, I’m fully aware my version of “free time” is still… working. On the business. Another post for another day.

Our studio ethos has always been: to design for this world, you need to be out in it.

True to this, last year we visited twelve or so cities.

Along the way, I’ve been archiving what we see as we go. Street signs, toilet paper, storefronts, graphics on trucks, receipts, chip packets, cartons of milk, napkins. Every form of printed matter.

Because when you’re out in the world, you start to notice that each city has its own visual fingerprint, shaped by layers of historical, cultural, political and social context, past and present.

This is a series of those findings.

Which brings me to Japan.

Yes, I know. Everyone is in Japan right now. Stay with me on this.

What I noticed

Illustrations are everywhere. On milk cartons, train adverts, snack packaging, bathroom walls. Less as decoration but more as a form of communication. It’s the dominant visual language of the country.

Characters soften instructions, mascots walk you through bureaucracy. There’s an illo telling you how to flush a toilet, another explaining how long to microwave your konbini noodles.

Illos bring a sense of optimism and if you know anything about the pressures of everyday Japanese life, that makes perfect sense.

My second observation: Japan is enamoured with all things analogue.

Book stores, cigarettes over vaping, clocks, watches, vinyl. Not performative, not ironically retro. Just a love of craftsmanship.

P.S Jas wanted me to include this horse inspiration she found…?

More reporting to come.