NUK Cafe. This was Design Kompany’s first design project in Cambodia, the naming and branding for a cafe.
The cafe owners had experience in marketing and architecture so were quite familiar with the value of design. This was good. It meant we could explore a range of ideas together, and that they would be open and receptive. Often in Southeast Asia, the conversation and concept development phase is skipped over to arrive quickly at ‘solutions’, but Design Kompany’s preference is to work slowly towards finding the right story to tell and shaping a design idea to fit that.
‘Many times designers will do what you tell them to do. But you two would not,’ said Kenneth Hui, NUK Cafe’s co-owner, referring to the process that DK’s team used to use and reflecting on how it helped them. ‘You would say, ‘No. That’s not a good idea, and we’re not gonna do that.’ That was new. You made us think, and in the end, we got to a stronger design together. Thank you.’
Design Kompany worked with their two-person team that wanted to make a cafe and sell ice cream. They needed a strong brand identity design to do this, and knew that it would take a lot of focusing to find the right ‘look and feel.’ Our design work began in earnest, starting from scratch, and, through the unfolding magic of the creative process and cross-collaboration which we found in this client dream team, it worked well. Design Kompany created the brand identity and found a name.
NUK.
