Each design studio faces the identical downside: how do you showcase the work that does not seem in a ultimate design file? The invisible labour of technique—the positioning frameworks, the naming rationales, the painstaking narrative structure—not often makes it into the polished case research.
What we get as a substitute is the design business’s most drained system: hero shot, course of overview, shiny deliverables, credit. Rinse, repeat, yawn.
Lauren Wong Lee and Gabby Lord—the design duo who work collectively as Tremendous Eager Studio—has determined this merely will not do any extra. Their new studio web site takes direct intention on the conventional case research format with an strategy that feels each apparent and revolutionary. Particularly, embedded video pop-ups that actually interrupt your scroll to elucidate the considering behind the inventive.
It is a format born from frustration. “We have all the time discovered it tough to showcase our technique work,” explains Gabby. “A lot of it’s both too confidential to share straight or too complicated to elucidate with out shedding the nuance. What actually pushed us to rethink was noticing how imbalanced our case research had been. We tackle three sorts of initiatives: Technique + Design, Technique-only, and Design-only. However till now, we solely had case research when design was concerned, and that not noted a giant a part of our work.”
For Lauren, the stakes had been extra private. “I additionally collaborate lots with design studios that do not have in-house technique experience. I am actually happy with lots of that work, however we did not have a great format to inform these tales. We thought this video strategy was a great way to spotlight these partnerships and the good work we did with out overstating our position on the visible facet of issues.”
Human strategy
The selection of video—particularly, movies that includes Lauren’s precise face and voice—was deliberate. “We aren’t satisfied that folks would really learn lengthy write-ups,” Gabby admits bluntly. “It is onerous to seize consideration today! After we checked out how individuals had been actually consuming data and studying about initiatives, a lot of it was occurring in video format, on TikTok. We figured, if we won’t beat them, let’s be part of them.”
There’s vulnerability on this strategy. Placing faces entrance and centre means nowhere to cover. However the duo imagine that is exactly the purpose.
“Analysis reveals it actually works,” Gabby continues. “Content material that includes actual human faces will get much more engagement. And in a second the place a lot of what we see on-line is AI-generated or slop, displaying our precise selves felt like essentially the most human, trustworthy factor we may do.”
It is a canny statement. In an period of artificial imagery and algorithmic homogeneity, displaying an precise human explaining precise considering feels virtually radical. The format additionally sidesteps one of many perennial anxieties round discussing design work: that explaining it someway diminishes the magic.
Lauren does not purchase into that worry. “Nice design, to me, is all the time strategic,” she stresses. “It ought to by no means be overly mental, pompous, or onerous to grasp. I believe individuals love listening to the tales behind design. I believe it makes them extra within the work and extra impressed with the considering and care that goes into the issues they see.”
Consumer confidentiality
This philosophy extends to how they deal with shopper confidentiality, which is all the time a thorny problem when showcasing technique work. “We work on lots of actually delicate initiatives, from new product improvements to thoroughly new corporations working in stealth,” Lauren explains. “Due to that, we do not share initiatives that shoppers aren’t prepared or comfy to share publicly. We do not share proprietary IP or delicate enterprise and product data. We do not present model technique frameworks.
“A number of the strategic work we do is crafting the story the model desires to inform to the world,” she continues. “After we discuss concerning the strategic strategy of a venture, we’re typically telling the identical story the model is attempting to broadcast to its viewers. In different phrases, what we share in our case research needs to be the identical story anybody can discover on the model’s web site, campaigns, and social content material. It needs to be the story that shines via in each side of the model, from the design system to the pictures to the copywriting.”
The brand new web site format additionally displays the duo’s working dynamic. With Gabby main design and Lauren main technique, the video pop-ups mirror their collaborative course of. “On the very least, it is our try and mirror it,” Gabby says. “Largely it is a option to highlight extra of what Lauren does; technique makes up half of our enterprise providing. Whereas Lauren leads technique and I lead design, we each cross over into one another’s disciplines as a result of we imagine they’re stronger collectively than remoted.”
For Lauren, who says she “acquired used to retaining quiet and having my work keep beneath the radar,” the brand new format has been a revelation. “Our outdated web site made it unattainable to indicate all of the naming we did, all of the collaborations we labored on with different studios, and even how various our shopper record actually is. We needed to ensure issues had been totally different with this new web site.”
Recent format
As for whether or not this gamble will rework how the business values technique work, the duo are refreshingly trustworthy. “We do not know but if this shift will result in extra enterprise or change how individuals worth technique, however we needed to attempt one thing new,” Gabby says. “It is a contemporary format for us to play with, and we have been pleasantly stunned by how a lot we take pleasure in making them. As soon as we get previous the half the place we now have to see our personal faces, in fact.”
Lauren echoes the sentiment: “It has been enjoyable to practise one thing new, even when content material creation wasn’t on SK’s bingo card for this 12 months. We hope individuals have enjoyable studying concerning the venture. We hope they get within the wonderful companies our shoppers have constructed. And we hope that folks see how nice technique and design are once they’re put collectively.”
Whether or not this marks the dying of the standard case research stays to be seen. However make no mistake: Tremendous Eager has achieved one thing uncommon and galvanizing right here. They’ve created a format that serves each their work and their viewers, with out sacrificing both strategic rigour or inventive magic. That alone makes it value testing.
