NVB Studio
NVB Studio
Playful website design and development for a leading architectural and landscape design firm in educational spaces.
With over 25 years in practice, award-winning NVB studio have built an enviable reputation for ground-breaking architecture in education, community and public space. To define the studio as a leader in this sector, the Somerset-based practice set out on a repositioning and rebranding project, to promote their combined skills in architecture and landscape design in creating holistic educational environments, and shape perceptions around their approach to R&D.
To build on this strategic focus, NVB needed a bold new identity and platform to own their experience and capture the real-world impact of their work. We were brought onboard to develop the brand identity designed by Supple Studio into an engaging digital presence that showcased NVB’s ethos of empathy and innovation in architecture.
Services used
- Research and strategy
- Content strategy
- UX design
- Prototyping
- Responsive website design
- UI Animation
- Front end development
- Craft CMS development
- Website hosting
The Challenge
A central challenge to the website was to retain the sense of professionalism and technical integrity to NVB’s services, while emphasising how their attitude to continuous learning and development results in stimulating spaces that don’t just facilitate learning and play, but inspire it. Inspired by a classic sliding puzzle toy, we animated the block shapes to bring a sense of playfulness and joy to the user experience.
Inspiring imagination and play
Our collaborative approach with Supple Studio gave us the opportunity to explore how the digital expression of the brand identity could materialise early on, experimenting with how the bold yet flexible brand elements could evolve to the digital design.
From the sliding homepage blocks to the navigation scroll detail, the consistent application and interactive details of these core graphical elements brings a sense of playfulness and exploration to the website; connecting the user to NVB’s distinctive personality and providing consistent identity expression across brand and digital.
Creating space to thrive
A series of interviews provided a detailed understanding of NVB’s experience, target audience and personality, informing a website content strategy that employed bright and spacious layouts to maximise the visual impact of their educational environments.
We took a ‘less AND more’ approach, platforming the best examples of their work in both architecture and landscape design. Fewer pages and case studies, but a greater emphasis on the details, resulted in a refined portfolio that could connect with related research and thought-leadership. This way, the content showcases their experience, while reflecting their aspirations to secure bigger, more ambitious projects.
Working with Supple and Mud has been an exciting and rewarding process, but above all they have made it a pleasurable voyage of discovery. We had always struggled to articulate who we are and relied on our buildings to speak for us. It became clear at an early stage that they understood who we are and have developed a digital presence which not only reflects the people we didn’t know we were but also articulates where we are going. Their clarity of thinking and attention to detail in execution has resulted in a website we are really proud of.James McGillivray
