Three ways to work with us.
Every engagement is built around where a business already is, not around a package we would like to sell. Here is what each one suits, roughly how long it runs, and the work that came out of it.
From a fortnight to as long as it keeps paying off.
The solid line is the shortest each one runs and the faint line is the honest range. The ticks are how often you see work. Ranges assume you can review and decide within a few working days.
Key Engagements
Three engagement models, each built around where you are and what you need.
Keystone
Complete brand & product build
A full-scope engagement across strategy, brand and product. One team, defined deliverables, clear timeline. This is how we build from zero.
Ideal for — New brands, product launches, complete overhauls
Nexus
Retained creative partnership
Ongoing design partnership with dedicated hours, a named team and priority access. Work that compounds month over month.
Ideal for — Ongoing partnerships, consistent creative needs
Momentum
High-intensity sprint
One problem, total focus, fast execution. Short timeline, full team commitment, designed for immediate impact.
Ideal for — Focused execution, time-sensitive problems
Keystone
Complete brand & product build
A full-scope engagement across strategy, brand and product. One team, defined deliverables, clear timeline. This is how we build from zero.
Ideal for — New brands, product launches, complete overhauls
Nexus
Retained creative partnership
Ongoing design partnership with dedicated hours, a named team and priority access. Work that compounds month over month.
Ideal for — Ongoing partnerships, consistent creative needs
Momentum
High-intensity sprint
One problem, total focus, fast execution. Short timeline, full team commitment, designed for immediate impact.
Ideal for — Focused execution, time-sensitive problems
Keystone
A complete brand and product build, from first positioning to launch.
One team carries the whole thing. Strategy decides what the business means, identity gives it a form, and product turns both into something people use, without the handovers where intent usually goes missing.
It is the right answer when there is no settled brand underneath the thing you want to build, because building the product first means building it twice. Defined deliverables, a clear timeline, and a launch at the end of it.
- Right when
- You are building from nothing, or what you have no longer fits
- Typical timeframe
- 8 to 16 weeks
- Cadence
- Weekly reviews
Strategy
Decide what the business means, who it is for and why anyone should care.
Identity
Give that decision a form, and a system that holds it together.
Product
Turn both into something people use, designed and built by the same team.
Launch
Defined deliverables, shipped. Then a clean handover, or a Nexus if the work keeps going.
Nexus
A retained partnership for work that compounds month over month.
A named team, dedicated hours and priority access. The same people every month, who already know the decisions behind the brand and do not need re-briefing on the history each time something new comes up.
It suits a business where creative demand is constant rather than occasional. The value is in the accumulation, since the fourth month is faster than the first because nothing has to be explained twice.
- Right when
- The creative work never really stops
- Typical timeframe
- 3 months and onward
- Cadence
- Monthly, with priority access
Month one
The team learns the decisions behind the brand, once.
Every month
The same people, working through whatever comes up.
Month four onward
Faster than the first, because nothing has to be explained twice.
Momentum
One problem, total focus, a short engagement built for immediate impact.
The full team on one problem, for a short and fixed window. No discovery phase that outlives its usefulness and no scope that grows while nobody is looking, because the timeline will not allow either.
It works when the problem is already well understood and the constraint is time. It is a poor fit when the real question is what the business should be, which is what Keystone is for.
- Right when
- The date is fixed and something is in the way
- Typical timeframe
- 2 to 4 weeks
- Cadence
- Daily, for a short run
Define
The problem is already understood, so the first days lock the scope rather than reopen it.
Make
The full team on one problem, for the whole window.
Ship
Delivered inside the window. The timeline will not let the scope grow, which is the point.
Frequently asked questions
You do not have to decide. Tell us where you are and what needs to be true in six months, and we will tell you which one fits, including when the answer is none of them. People arrive asking for Keystone and leave with Momentum more often than the other way round.
Yes, and that is usually a Momentum or a Keystone depending on whether the brand underneath it is settled. If it is, a site is a focused piece of work. If it is not, building the site first means building it twice, and we will say so before you commit.
They assume you can review and decide within a few working days. The single biggest cause of an engagement running long is not the work, it is waiting on a decision that needs someone who was not in the room. We name the decision makers at kickoff for that reason.
Senior people, and the same ones from the first call to the handover. Around the core studio sits a network of specialist freelancers assembled per project, so the work goes to whoever is genuinely right for it rather than to whoever happens to be free.
Most Keystone builds become a Nexus, because a brand and a product need maintaining rather than finishing. That is a choice at the end, not a commitment at the start, and plenty of work ends cleanly with a handover and nothing more.
Yes. The studio runs from Manchester and Dubai, and the work has shipped for clients in the UK, the US, the UAE and beyond. Engagements run async first with structured reviews, and we travel for the phases that genuinely need a room.