WHERE DESIGN LIVES

British furniture and homeware retailer Heal’s has today unveiled WHERE DESIGN LIVES, its biggest brand-building investment in over a decade, with a £1m campaign created with independent agency Tomorrowism. Timed to coincide with the London Design Festival, this multi-channel culture-first project signals a bold reset for the 215-year-old retailer. It aims to reclaim Heal’s position as Britain’s original design authority at a time when interiors culture has become dominated by derivative copycats, fast furniture and short-lived trends.

As part of the wide-ranging reset, Tomorrowism has repositioned Heal’s communications around a powerful cultural tension: the “great flattening” of British interiors. With home inspiration increasingly shaped by algorithm-led feeds and generic design, WHERE DESIGN LIVES positions Heal’s as a distinctive voice championing authentic design and individuality in an era of homogenisation.

Sitting behind the campaign is a refreshed visual identity, positioning and brand voice/attitude, developed by Tomorrowism to reinforce the brand’s authority as a design institution. The new design system spans all elements of the brand’s visual world, brand behaviour and customer experience, to help position the brand as intriguing, credible and aspirational to design-aware, culturally-curious people.

The campaign itself spans striking OOH, print, social, web and store-level executions developed using the refreshed brand toolkit. Tomorrowism focused on stripping back assets to their essentials, creating intelligent design solutions with fewer elements. A new colour palette embraces the brand’s legacy blue tones while opening up a more design-led, contemporary feeling. Likewise the fresh approach to typography.

Central to the design refresh is the new logo lock-up: an energetic hand-drawn mark that evokes the spirit of design and celebrates human creativity; and a more confident tone of voice that re-establishes Heal’s as a cultural authority with a provocative point of view.

In a departure from ‘polite’ heritage messaging - where heritage brands are often respected but can feel cold or intimidating - Heal’s is speaking from the heart, insightfully, about the life-changing power of good design, and what’s really at stake when our homes lose personality and individuality. By plugging into live cultural conversations and sharpening up its voice and personality, Heal’s is positioned as not just historically significant, but also culturally vital.

A series of OOH executions uses well-observed headlines that demonstrate the brand’s deep understanding of design. Lines such as “There’s a reason why all the best chairs are always taken”, “Good design. You know it when you feel it” and “You can stop blurring your background now” give the brand a voice that is wry, witty and approachable.

The campaign also hands the mic to a cast of cultural figures (all long-time Heal’s shoppers who credit the brand with shaping their appreciation of design). A five-episode shoppable documentary series blends culture, content and commerce as Heal’s taps its cultural authority and deep knowledge of design to open the doors to private spaces, telling the stories of how good design impacts the lives of these highly-respected creative people.

Instead of traditional interiors influencers, Tomorrowism brought together voices from fashion, film, food and design. The line-up includes filmmaker and writer Reggie Yates, Net-a-Porter’s global head of styling Harriet Haskell Thomas, textiles designer Pearl Lowe, master tailor Charlie Casely-Hayford and the creative industries’ most-loved baker, Claire Ptak of Violet Bakery.

Directed by Stella Scott, the five-part series goes beyond formulaic home tours to capture how good design shapes and elevates daily life, work and creative practice. Each film offers an autobiographical glimpse into unseen private spaces - part documentary, part design story. The result is a blend of cultural storytelling and aspirational commerce that demonstrates the powerful influence good design can have on a life, in unexpected and personal ways.

WHERE DESIGN LIVES will be amplified through cultural partnerships; high-impact store windows and events at Heal’s iconic Tottenham Court Road flagship and beyond, across its store estate; a wide range of out-of-home sites across London and the SE; print partnerships with design and culture titles; and a dynamic suite of social and digital storytelling – all reasserting Heal’s unique authority as a design institution.