‘Around the world, more and more folks want to live flexibly. Those who live and work in a city for anywhere from 5 days to 3 months and then move on. At traditional hotels you can get lonely and have to adapt. Zoku thinks it’s their job to adapt. People need flex, respect and the option to make offline connections. And that’s where Zoku comes in.’
To introduce this concept to new collaborators, we created the brand, brand story, illustrated identity, and a website that catapulted Zoku into reality and garnered international acclaim. After the hotel’s successful Amsterdam launch in 2015, I worked closely with the Zoku team to provide additional content and trained the in-house marketing team on the established tone: straightforward, engaging, and – like people should be in everyday life – unafraid of the occasional corny joke. The tone and much of the text remain. Zoku now also has locations in Paris, Vienna, and Copenhagen.
Services: manifesto, website text, signage, tone
Clients: Festina Amsterdam and Zoku, 2015–2018
See current website.
Illustrations and art direction by the amazing Rein van der Ven.
Zoku’s music room with provided wall text. Actually I most proud of the wall text behind the dirty dishes cart: ‘The dish cart is on a Zen break. It will return as soon as it’s empty.‘
The following are screenshots from the original pre-opening website when Zoku was still looking for initial partners and investors.
Manifesto as painted on ground of Zoku’s entrance.
