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Studio · 03 / 04

Branding Laboratory: brand identity, lookbooks, press and launches for jewellery brands

The collection is where the work starts, because the pieces are what is being sold: the identity, the prices and the launch are built around them.

Discuss Branding Laboratory Request a quote: Branding Laboratory
A brand laid out for review: lookbook, box, cards and palette.Watch the film: Branding Laboratory
A brand laid out for review: lookbook, box, cards and palette.

What Branding Laboratory does

  • Brand development and marketing

    For jewellery designers and brands.

    A jewellery business made legible: to a buyer deciding whether to stock it, to an editor deciding whether to write about it, and to the person who will wear it. It starts by asking what the brand is for and who it is for, and whether the collection says the same thing.

  • Brand identity and collection alignment

    The mark, the type and the colours, set against the collection rather than beside it.

    An identity has to survive being printed on a ring box, a line sheet, a trade-show banner and a phone screen, and still sit naturally next to the pieces. When the identity and the collection tell different stories, buyers notice before the brand does.

  • Lookbooks and line sheets

    What a collection is shown in, and what it is ordered from.

    Both are made from the finished pieces and their real prices, so the two agree piece for piece and a buyer has everything needed to place an order. They are what the Commercial Studio takes to retailers when it sells a collection in.

  • Press and editorial relations

    Editors written to about a piece, and the samples that follow.

    Most jewellery coverage is of a piece rather than of a brand, so the collection is read the way an editor will read it. Each piece goes out with its pictures, its price and where to buy it, and a sample lent for a shoot should be logged out and back in.

  • Content and social

    Pictures and words that follow the collection rather than the calendar.

    Made from the same photographs of the final samples as the lookbook, the line sheet and the press, and planned with the launch, so that one story is told wherever a collection appears.

  • Launch campaigns

    A date, a set of pictures, and the order people see them in.

    A launch is a sequence, and most of its problems come from doing the steps out of order: photographing before the samples are final, or setting prices after the line sheet has gone out. The date is set with the press calendar in mind, and on the day the collection is live on the brand’s own channels and at its stockists.

  • Brand collateral: the box, the book, the card

    What a piece is handed over in, and what goes with it.

    Made with the identity, as part of the same work, and costed into every piece: the box, the pouch and the card that travels with it are part of what a price has to pay for.

  • Jewellery pricing

    What a piece can be asked for, where it is being sold.

    Every piece is costed on its own, then the price is worked backwards from what comparable pieces sell for where the brand wants to sell, leaving each channel its margin. Repricing before launch is far easier than repricing after the first stockists have bought.

How it starts

  1. You say what you would like to discuss, and the days that suit you.

  2. We confirm a time by email, within two working days.

  3. A first conversation by video, to hear your brief before anything is agreed.

Every piece of work is quoted to its brief.

Questions

Who is Gemlea for?

Jewellery designers and brands, not private collectors.

Can you help with pricing my jewellery?

Yes. Jewellery pricing is part of Gemlea Branding Laboratory: what a piece can be asked for, where it is being sold. A range is checked against what it costs to make, what comparable pieces sell for in the target market, and the margin each channel, retail or direct, needs.

What is the difference between a line sheet and a lookbook?

A line sheet is what a collection is ordered from: every piece with its reference, materials, prices and terms. A lookbook is what a collection is shown in: styled and worn pictures that tell the brand’s story to buyers, press and customers, with few facts. Wholesale buyers usually want both.

Can we start working with you at any stage?

Yes. Gemlea meets you and supports you at any point of your jewellery business and journey, whether that is a single sourcing brief or a full collection from concept to production.

What about fees, minimums, lead times or NDAs?

We agree this in the brief, project by project, as it depends on what you need from us.