Founded by Sir Terence Conran in 1973, the Conran Shop has long championed the design world’s most respected and emerging talents, with retail locations across London, Paris, Japan, and South Korea. While Conran, who also founded Habitat passed away in 2020, his legacy lives on in the Conran Shop, which is marking its 50th anniversary this year.

As the brand’s CEO Peter Jenkins points out, it’s been “a big year of transformation and new direction for the brand”. It entered new territories in Asia with the launch of its wholesale partnership with Lane Crawford; in the UK, it is set to open a new London flagship store in Sloane Square in September; and it is also expanding into new markets in the Middle East.

The anniversary felt like an apt moment to look at the Conran Store’s entire visual output, resulting in a new global brand identity developed with Pentagram partner Sascha Lobe and brand strategist Kimberly Lloyd.

The new identity features a brand architecture logo system and a bespoke typeface family which nods to the modernity and sophistication of the retailer’s stores, while paying homage to the brand’s late founder himself.

“Our extensive work on the visual identity for the Conran Shop incorporates not only the typeface but also its entire visual language,” says Lloyd. “The result is an open, diverse, and versatile identity that carries with it a sense of trustworthiness and speaks a universal language, suited for all markets.”

The brand architecture is a dynamic system revolving around the line ‘The Conran Shop’, which acts as its spine while providing a foundation for expansion.

As the retailer continues to develop in existing and new territories, the brand architecture needed to accommodate the unique characteristics of each market. To achieve this balance, each logo marque is designed to serve as a “visual ambassador” in its respective territory, according to the brand.

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