Brand design is not your logo. It’s isn’t just your colour palette and *shock* it isn’t all just visual. Effective brand design is a whole system – one that works hard to make your brand instantly recognisable and impossible to forget.
Brand design principles are the guidelines that help your brand show up consistently, confidently – no matter where it appears. Website, social media, packaging design, billboard, tote bag... these principles are what tie it all together.
So what are they, why do they matter, and how do you figure yours out?
Let’s break it down.
Brand design principles are the behind-the-scenes operators of every brand that knows who they really are. They’re the living, breathing rules of engagement that shape how your brand shows up in the world. Visually. Verbally. Emotionally. Every font choice, every shade of blue, every weird little illustration or confident headline – it all stems from these principles. And they aren’t plucked out of thin air either. They’re deeply rooted in your brand’s core identity.
Your brand’s core identity involves your values, your voice, your mission, your weird quirks, your beliefs about what matters, and how you want to make people feel. Good brand principles translate all of the above into something you can build from.
Without them, things get messy. You start to drift. Your fonts change far too often. Your team isn’t sure if you’re supposed to be “playful” or “professional.” One day you’re beige minimalism, the next day it’s neon chaos. If this sounds familiar, don’t worry you’re in the right place to sort it out 👇.
Design principles keep you grounded, but how? 🤔:
Every brand can define its own principles on their own but there are a few foundational ones that only great brands nail. Think of these as your starting point:
The best brands aren’t scared to be understood. In fact, they want to be. But somewhere along the way, “clever” started getting mistaken for “better.” Brands overthink things. They reject the obvious. They make weird design choices to stand out but they end up losing people in the process.
Here’s the truth: if your audience has to work hard to figure out who you are or what you’re saying, they won’t bother (just like you wouldn’t).
That “cool” but barely legible typeface? It might look great on your moodboard, but not when someone’s squinting at your packaging in a supermarket aisle, which is where the role typography plays on your packaging really matters. Cramped layouts with 12 overlapping headlines and no breathing room? Visually stressful. And no, no one’s reading a shampoo bottle covered in dense text — not even your mum.
Clarity doesn’t have to mean boring, it means it’s accessible to the people that matter. It means you value your audience’s time and attention. It means your design helps people get the message instantly.
So choose fonts that are easy to read. Use space. Say what you mean. You’re not dumbing things down, you’re building trust.
🟢 Good Example: Mailchimp’s design is clear, quirky, and super easy to use wherever you experience the brand (from web to email). Their use of clean layouts, friendly typography, and those slightly oddball illustrations gives everything a human touch. It feels like they’ve thought about every interaction, it’s always approachable and never overwhelming.
🔴 Bad Example: A fancy serif font you can't read on mobile. You need to make sure the font can be read across all marketing efforts.
That ultra-fancy serif font that looks stunning in print but a nightmare at small sizes or on low-res screens. Fonts like Didot or Bodoni are timeless, high-contrast classics – elegant, dramatic, but totally unreadable when crammed into a phone screen or a social post. Their razor-thin strokes and extreme contrast might scream luxury, but they also whisper good luck reading this.
Don’t get us wrong – these fonts can work brilliantly in the right context (like a luxury skincare homepage with loads of white space), but as body copy on mobile or a CTA button? Bad idea.
Image source: mailchimp.com
People trust what they recognise … simple as that. That’s why you’ll see tons of brands showing up the same way, everywhere. Your colour palette, tone of voice, photography style – all of it needs to feel like it’s coming from the same brain.
Yes, you can flex for seasonal design if you want. A Valentine’s Day promo or limited-edition summer range doesn’t mean your brand has to suddenly wear a whole new outfit. You can play within the system but the core elements still need to be there. Your audience should know it’s you instantly, even if the message or visuals are temporary.
🟢 Good Example: Apple. Always clean, always confident. Always an experience.
🔴 Bad Example: Rebranding every six months because you don’t know who you are.
Design is communication. So if you’re picking pastel pink just because it’s trending, or slapping a random font on your homepage because you saw it on someone else’s, you’re missing the point.
Every design decision you make should tie back to your brand’s purpose. That means your values, your story, your audience, your why. Because when the design matches the mission, your brand starts to feel like something people can believe in.
More and more, people want to buy from brands that stand for something, and that often shows up in the new biodegradable, eco-friendly packaging options they choose. In fact, 71% of consumers prefer to support brands aligned with their personal values. And know exactly when you're faking it. That’s why more customers are in favour of brands that reduce packaging waste through smart design and habits.
🟢 Good Example: Patagonia gets this right on every level and is a benchmark for sustainable brand design that’s genuinely green and seen. Their stripped-back, unfussy design reflects their anti-consumerist stance. They don’t over-design, they don’t chase trends, and they don’t pretend to be something they’re not. Their aesthetic reinforces their mission to do less harm, use fewer resources, and protect the planet.
🔴 Bad Example: A brand shouting about sustainability while using non-recyclable black plastic and metallic foil in their packaging. You can’t ignore the carbon footprint of your packaging choices if you want to be viewed as eco-friendly. If the look contradicts the message, customers notice and naturally doubt you.
You should know this by now … brand design needs to make people feel something. We’re wired for emotion, not logic. We buy with our gut, justify with our head, and remember how things made us feel way more than what they looked like.
Sure, aesthetics matter, but they’re not the end goal. If your design is beautiful but emotionally empty, then what’s the point? When a brand makes us feel seen, understood, or inspired, that’s where the magic happens. Emotion builds connection. Connection builds trust. And trust is the source of success for your brand.
That’s why design that taps into emotion, like vintage-inspired packaging that taps into nostalgia, hits differently. It’s familiar. It’s comforting. It makes people feel connected before they’ve even touched the product.
🟢 Good Example: Dove absolutely nails this with its Real Beauty campaign. The design itself is simple and soft – lots of white space, calm typography, and no-frills photography, but the emotional impact is huge. Real people, real stories, real bodies. Dove uses design to amplify their message of self-acceptance and confidence.
🔴 Bad Example: Brands that obsess over being “aesthetic” but forget to make you feel something. All polish, no pulse. You scroll past them because they’re technically perfect… and emotionally forgettable.
The bottom line is … make people feel something. Awe. Joy. Comfort. Confidence. Whatever emotion suits your brand and then just lean into it.
Your brand should evolve but not shapeshift completely. Design systems need to work across formats (digital, print, social, etc.) without falling apart. That means creating a flexible, modular system: logos that adapt, colour palettes that scale, and templates that can grow with you.
🟢 Good Example: Spotify is a masterclass in flexible design. Their core brand elements, like their use of bold colour, expressive typography, and fluid shapes, are tailored to adapt across every mood, moment, genre, and playlist. Whether you’re listening to ‘90s grunge or ambient whale sounds, the visuals flex to fit the vibe without losing that unmistakable Spotify-ness. They’re constantly shifting context, yet the brand holds together effortlessly.
🔴 Bad Example: That brand that looks banging on its homepage, but the second you see it printed, it’s either illegible, misaligned, or just… off. Maybe the logo gets lost on a white background. Maybe the font doesn’t work in small sizes. Maybe the colour palette can’t be reproduced outside a screen. Whatever the case, it’s a clear sign the brand was designed for one surface and forgot the rest exists.
Moral of the story? If your brand can’t survive outside a perfect Instagram square, it’s time to build some stretch into your system.
Finally, design should be true to you. Don’t try to copy what’s cool. Instead, focus on building a brand that feels genuine and reflects who you are and what you stand for. Trends come and go so don’t just jump on the bandwagon for the sake of it. We’re seeing a lot of this now so don’t fall for the trap. Standing out comes from being unapologetically real.
Design that’s authentic needs to be believable and that comes from staying consistent with your values. Speaking in your voice..
🟢 Good Example: Who Gives A Crap is the gold standard for staying true to themselves. Their visuals are bright and punchy, just like their brand voice. They talk about toilets, climate change, and global sanitation without sounding preachy or boring. It works because it’s them. Their tone, their mission and vibe are all perfectly in sync.
🔴 Bad Example: A forgettable tech startup with the usual suspects: a safe sans-serif logo, pastel gradients, a vague tagline like “Empowering Solutions for a Better Tomorrow”, and not a hint of personality. You’ve seen this brand 100 times and forgotten it 100 times, too.
It’s not terrible. It’s just beige. And in branding, beige is the death zone. No tension, no story, no reason to care. Just another name in a sea of sameness.
Image source: whogivesacrap.org
Image source: whogivesacrap.org
Here’s a quick process to build your brand design principles from scratch (or refine the ones you have):
Write some actionable principles like:
They’re the glue that holds your brand together as you grow, especially when you’re scaling across new platforms, markets, or product lines.
And if defining your brand design principles feels like a mountain to climb, don’t worry, it’s literally what we do at Noramble. Don’t sweat it. We help brands define who they are and how they show up across packaging, digital, and everything in between.
Want a hand? You know where we are if you need us 😉. Let’s talk?
