We sat down with the group at Aeon Studio, a Croatian design studio, to seek out out the ins and outs of a design company, the challenges of their design course of, and the way to handle consumer expectations. They speak us by way of how they use Sketch to ship high-quality designs to their purchasers and the way it helps them all through their inventive course of, from begin to end.
Are you able to inform us just a little about Aeon Studio?
We’re a group of 5 folks working collectively for over 5 years however collaborate with over 20 gifted professionals worldwide. Our CEO, Dejan Ilić, started his profession at 19 and inside a yr, he crafted an award-winning design for one among Croatia’s largest bus firms. We’ve intentionally stored our in-house group small, sustaining modest workplaces and investing in top-notch inventive expertise — this alternative ensures that we are able to ship high-quality work to our purchasers.
What do you assume makes purchasers select Aeon Studio over different design studios?
Most of our purchasers come to Aeon Studio by way of suggestions from individuals who have already labored with us. After we work with purchasers, they turn out to be our world, our all the things. There’s no nonsense, simply laborious work and outcomes. We have interaction in significant conversations, ask questions and attempt to perceive their wants completely, so we are able to do our job in addition to we are able to.
Some purchasers have a really clear concept of what design, product or change of their enterprise they wish to see. Nevertheless, our greatest outcomes come from difficult tasks that permit us to work hand in hand with a consumer that’s normally misplaced or not sure. Witnessing their transformation and seeing how our work brings smiles to their faces is probably the most rewarding achievement for us.
What does your design course of seem like?
Our design course of revolves across the wants of every mission and depends on the group’s various experience to brainstorm, conceptualize, and create refined designs. When approaching a brand new mission, we first conduct in-depth analysis and give attention to understanding the core values and aspirations of our purchasers, their model id, target market, and market positioning. This groundwork is the muse of our inventive technique.
What does nice design imply to you?
In our view, nice design is a mix of aesthetics, performance, and emotional resonance. It’s not nearly creating visually interesting paintings but additionally about fixing issues, enhancing person experiences, and creating emotional connections. In fact, we additionally consider that no matter we’re designing, particularly if we’re speaking interfaces, needs to be intuitive and user-friendly, and ship an gratifying expertise.
The Worldwide Design Awards lately awarded gold within the Print/Packaging class to Aeon’s Premium Truffles design.
What are a few of the most frequent challenges you encounter all through the design course of and the way do you overcome them?
One widespread problem is discovering a steadiness between creativity and practicality. Purchasers usually come to us with formidable inventive visions however these don’t work when put into follow or don’t reply to market calls for. We remedy this with a lot of collaborative periods with them the place we attempt to discover the steadiness between creativity and feasibility within the options that we give you.
Managing consumer expectations and suggestions can be tough. To navigate this, we set life like expectations from the outset, outlining mission timelines, deliverables, and potential revisions. We schedule common consumer check-ins and suggestions periods to resolve issues as quickly as attainable and make changes.
Staying up-to-date with design tendencies and applied sciences is one other massive problem for us — issues are taking place quick. That’s why we set a while apart to take part in conferences and interact in boards inside the trade.
How does Sketch enable you deliver these tasks to life and obtain such high quality in them?
Sketch has been key to the standard of our tasks from begin to end, serving to us make our inventive visions tangible and actual. As a result of Sketch is so versatile, we’ve been in a position to work on a variety of tasks, from intricate branding ideas to app interfaces.
We combine Sketch proper from the start. As quickly as we conceptualize a mission, we leap into Sketch to draft out our concepts, create wireframes, and develop the preliminary design ideas. Sketch offers us instruments that assist us discover and iterate rapidly, in addition to others to assist us craft intricate designs to make sure each factor is pixel-perfect (we love vector modifying 💖). Whether or not we’re refining logos, creating detailed illustrations, or designing person interfaces, Sketch offers us all the things we have to obtain a degree of high quality that really stands out.
You talked about you’ve been inspired to make use of different instruments like Figma however what retains you coming again to Sketch?
Sure, we’ve explored different design instruments out there, together with Figma. Nevertheless, there are some things about Sketch that maintain us coming again. To start out with, its person interface and workflow are extremely intuitive and user-friendly. We love how its easy UI helps us give attention to the inventive elements of our tasks reasonably than getting slowed down by advanced menus and options.
We’re additionally massive followers of working offline — uninterrupted productiveness is one thing we really worth. Whereas cloud-based collaboration is nice, having the choice to work seamlessly with out an Web connection offers us the pliability to work from anyplace. Having the ability to do that in Sketch matches proper with the best way we work.
Final however not least, having labored with Sketch for thus a few years, we’ve developed a deep understanding of the device and learnt the way to take it to its full potential to make us extra environment friendly and exact in our day by day work. At this level, Sketch is not only a design software program for us, it’s a inventive associate that helps us deliver our visions to life.
Sketch is not only a design software program for us, it’s a inventive associate that helps us deliver our visions to life.
Might you run us by way of one among your favourite tasks thus far?
That’s a tough query — they’re all particular. However right here’s one which stands out.
A small family-owned vineyard and distillery requested us to design their labels. The labels started as detailed hand-drawn illustrations that captured the essence of the household’s heritage and the distinctive character of their wines and liquors. We then refined them in Sketch, which helped us experiment with completely different label shapes, sizes, and textures, making certain that every bottle turned a storytelling canvas. The labels, reworked from hand-drawn sketches to digital illustrations with Sketch, not solely mirrored the household’s legacy but additionally wine and liquor fanatics beloved it, turning their merchandise into collector’s gadgets.
From explorations to detailed designs, the group at Aeon Studio did all of it in Sketch
Are there any particular Sketch options that designers at Aeon Studio take pleasure in utilizing or are notably useful?
Every designer within the group has their favorites, however there are just a few in style ones throughout the entire group. If we had to decide on, it’d be Elements. They’re particularly useful when engaged on advanced tasks with a whole lot of layers, as they assist us keep organized and guarantee a structured and constant strategy to our designs. We additionally love the flexibility to copy and paste Types — it has stood the check of time and stays an important a part of our toolkit that helps us maintain constant styling throughout numerous components with out the necessity for handbook changes.
General, what do you take pleasure in probably the most about working at Aeon Studio? And, might you share with us what’s subsequent for you?
Undoubtedly, how passionate all of us really feel concerning the work we do. The vitality within the studio is contagious and makes each mission really feel like an journey. As for what’s subsequent, we’re presently excited to be engaged on a mission with an enormous consumer (can’t say a lot simply but, sorry 🤫) and we’re additionally taking part in several design competitions.
We love seeing how folks and groups are utilizing Sketch to create wonderful merchandise. You probably have one thing you wish to share with us, tell us in our group discussion board!