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April 9, 2025

The Luxury Brand Playbook

This Age of Anxiety is brutal and weighty. Time to remind ourselves how luxury brands will survive and thrive.

Our latest article for Luxury Briefing magazine details the ‘Luxury Playbook’ and explains the tools of the trade.

It's the fifteenth in our series and you can read all the others by following the links at the end of the article.

William S. Burroughs wrote a novel in 1959 called Naked Lunch. It became a counterculture classic. Shocking in parts, it’s not for everyone even now. He explained the title as: “A frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork.”

The phrase is a metaphor for seeing reality in its raw, unfiltered state, without illusion, social niceties, or denial. A moment of sudden clarity, where you’re forced to confront the harsh truth of life or your own existence.

Yes, I know, a heavy start but frankly, this Age of Anxiety is brutal and weighty. Time to remind ourselves how the role of the luxury brand model works and adapts.

Luxury has always been in a complex space where it both escapes reality (with great charm, craft, skill and elegance) but also reflects it depending on the moment – and of course what will sell.

Are we diverting attention away from the dizzying reality of the world by giving people pleasure with the most beautiful, exquisite, ‘things’ of highest quality, or are we celebrating power, status and wealth (as it always has done), or showcasing the human skills of artisanship, or being the saviours of the arts world bestowing intellectual refinement and financial help.

Here's the playbook:

Escapism

Pretty pictures, the creation of desire and we are excellent at it. We all know it’s hard to do fantasy, beauty, and pleasure well. Dreamy worlds, nostalgic designs, and immersive experiences to make customers feel good, even if only for a moment.

We can be heroes, just for one day. (Well actually a week. The standard minimum superyacht charter period is 7 days.)

We have opulence, comfort and extravagant craftsmanship. The auto, travel and hospitality sectors get it. We have nostalgia, timelessness, past aesthetics (classic tailoring) all saying stability.

We have experience over product; brands creating exclusive events and immersive worlds. Louis Vuitton’s 2024 fashion collection literally explored the world of ‘whimsical art’.

Players of this popular game will note the decadence of Ancient Rome in the face of decline, as the elite enjoyed groaning banquets, silk clothing, perfumes, and extravagant villas. (Forget your Michelin stars, think stuffed door mice, flamingo tongues, roast parrot, and swans served with feathers on). Also, the Jazz Age. After WWI the 1920s saw a luxury boom focused on pleasure, escapism, and rebellion against past troubles. Flappers, Art Deco, and Coco C’s designs to empower women’s’ lives.

Power

Some brands go for exclusivity and dominance. Never fails. But in uncertain times, people want symbols of control, authority, and status. Think quiet luxury/stealth wealth. No logos but status remains through material and cut, signalling power to those who know. Old money à la Loro Piana and Brunello Cucinelli. Aso ‘loud luxury’: bold, attention-grabbing with print, graphics and typography. Balenciaga’s experimental designs and unexpected materials and shapes. Or Tom Ford’s colours.

Students of this move will note how, in the C17th, Louis XIV made fashion and beauty, at his Versailles court an obsession, controlling the nobles by distracting them with etiquette, dress codes, and extravagant parties instead of France’s problems.

In the 1980s we had the Cold War, economic anxieties but with big logos, designer labels, and excessive displays of wealth. Chanel suits, Versace gold, Rolex watches….Wall Street celebrated greed on film.

Serious, mature, intellectual

This strategy involves moving away from extravagance and presenting brands as refined, culturally engaged, and meaningful with long-term value. Curators of knowledge, taste, and cultural capital. This move elevates luxury beyond materialism, making it a symbol of intelligence, and legitimacy.

As Leonard Cohen pointed out "Seriousness is voluptuous, and very few people have allowed themselves the luxury of it.”

Good examples include the Fondation Louis Vuitton, Fondation Cartier, Fondazione Prada and Gucci Garden.

Craft and heritage

This narrative is ever dependable and reliable. Always works. It gives luxury a moral justification, positioning it as preservers of tradition rather than just sellers of exclusivity. Examples are many, but honourable mentions to Hermès, Van Cleef, Aston Martin and Gaggenau who are all experts at reinforcing the idea that luxury is about artistry, precision and expertise, not just OTT consumption.

We can all see how the times are a-changin’. So, we adapt as luxury has always done. Most brands are using a combination of the above strategies. The loud with the soft, the introspective with the extravert, the serious with the playful, the solitary with the social, the subtle with the bold. You might say this isn’t new. The only difference is the context and its chaos. Luxury is more global, sustainable, tech of course, and more aware of its dynamics. More challenge, more opportunity.

Survival and success, as always, depends on our ability to evolve.

The science fiction writer H.G. Wells noted the world is constantly changing, and those who do not wish to be left behind must change with it:

‘Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature's inexorable imperative.’

Sounds about right.

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

How to sell luxury

It is 1814 and a father writes a letter to his son advising him what is needed for a successful career selling luxury brands. He talks about the need for beauty, art, enjoyment of life, craftsmanship, skill and the expertise needed to sell to HNW’s. You know, not so much has changed…

Our latest article for Luxury Briefing magazine unearths his letter – and talks about the ‘New Romantic’ future. It's the fourteenth in our series and you can read all the others by following the links at the end of the article.

A father’s letter to his son on entering the luxury business. The Tradesman. London 1814.

‘What if there was no luxury? If the rich man were to clothe himself in coarse woollen garments, or to be contented only with a miserable hut, a bundle of straw for his bed, a table and two stands for furniture should we not need the Manufacturers of cloths, of architects, printers, writers, builders and stone masons?

The dawn of the swan, the feathers of the goose, the horsehair which forms our mattresses? If luxury did not exist should we have painters, sculptors, goldsmiths, watchmakers, artists?

Those without feeling for the beautiful and sublime might answer ‘Society can do without all these things for they do not belong to the necessary wants of life’.

But I say we need more for the enjoyment of life than bread, milk and roots. The fine arts are necessary. They animate and sharpen our Understanding; they grant us the highest possible degree of enjoyment.

Art, commerce and luxury are fundamentally connected. If there were no rich people who would buy the beautiful picture from the painter, the statue from the sculptor, the ring from the jewellers, the watch from the watchmaker?

Who would be there to encourage the musician who has perhaps spent the better part of life in his endeavours to bring his instruments to perfection? The actor would be obliged to take the spade in his hand were there not people who, by their applause, encourage him to attain the highest excellence in the art.

You must sell with wisdom and humility. Your job is to be a friend to the people of Capital. Also, a friend to the arts and the artisan. You will be amply rewarded for your talent and skill.

And what if your customer has no real taste for luxury? He buys merely out of ostentation to display the extent of his riches. His vanity and weakness will always contribute to the sum of life’s general welfare and the circulation of his Wealth will be to the advancement of all.

You need to closely apply yourself not only in the superficiality of Wealth but also by its most particular bearings. You will find that this consciousness strengthens you. Exert yourself and enrich your mind with the most extended liberal ideas without which you will appear contemptible in your vocation.

Only by these means will you attain full success, make others happy and yourself too. Such is my guide for your future life. I hope your qualities of virtue, work, love, reflection and order will become exhilarating Springs which will impel the most noble actions. It is the dearest wish of my heart that you may persevere in the course you have chosen and that it will lead you to freedom and independence.’

Well… they sure don’t use sales advice from 1814 in LVMH staff training sessions, but some things remain constant.

If I re-wrote it for click bait, pull quotes, call outs, headlines, sub heads, and side bars, we’d still have a piece on the need for beauty, art, enjoyment of life, craftsmanship, skill and the expertise needed to sell to HNW’s.

And these core themes, it turns out, have become more important than ever, as luxury adapts to the new Industrial Revolution. OK computer, yes, AI and digi-precision is changing the zeitgeist.

But some commentators say there is a growing cultural resistance taking place. They say the value of skill, craftsmanship, and human expertise is being celebrated as never before – and a strange backlash to the tech era is being created: a New Romanticism.

Substack/NYT writers Ted Gioia and Ross Barkan believe that just as the C18th Enlightenment triggered a counter movement, led largely by artists and poets, so our current mania for “algorithmic, mechanistic thinking” will lead to a revolt against the rule of technology and the technocratic philosophies that justify it.

And this movement, like the 1800’s Romantics, highlights an intrinsic desire for authenticity and human connection in a world that feels more automated. Many will seek products with a soul, that that tell a story that embody the maker's expertise, that are life enriching, that are of real quality. Surely music to luxury brands’ ears.

Why shouldn’t ‘Best’ be better? Provocative art critic Robert Hughes said, in The Spectacle of Skill, where he contrasts the timelessness of true artistic achievement to the fleeting nature of faddish trends.

“I prefer the good to the bad, the articulate to the mumbling, the aesthetically developed to the merely primitive. I love the spectacle of skill, whether it's an expert gardener at work or a good carpenter chopping wood. I don't think ill-read people are as good to be with as wise and fully literate ones. I would rather watch a great tennis player than a mediocre one".

So, here’s to the timeless paradox of luxury sales, that will be tested as never before: wanting things to stay as they are, so things will have to change.

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

A coffee table book says much about your luxury brand

This unashamedly analogue medium has become a powerful communication tool in luxury brand marketing and personal story telling.

It delivers the major themes of luxury brands and indeed personal life journeys - creativity, beauty, highest quality craftsmanship, authenticity, design, authority, legacy, history, achievements, inspirations and future vision – in a bespoke experience like no other.

If these stories are important to you, a luxury custom book is the perfect platform to present your premium brand or personal world in more detail, with more emotional impact, with more weight, with more style than other media.

Its strong design aesthetics and compelling copywriting, makes it a unique addition to a luxury brand’s marketing –something many leading luxury brand marketers appreciate.

Source: Anew/ SO Creative Studio

The natural fit between print and luxury

Both are benchmarks of quality, care, and professionalism.

Brands also promise exclusivity, aspiration, cultural/intellectual capital, and tangible experiences that stimulate the senses – and that’s what the best luxury coffee table books deliver.

Just as it takes time to make an excellent product, it takes time to read a book. They are read with more focus and attention than a speedy scroll hunched over a screen.

Substance and meaning

Here’s LVMH’s view on it:

“What sets a luxury brand apart from an everyday brand lies in its essence, which is an act of creation. It’s about a vision brought to life via an uncompromising commitment to craftmanship. Sustainable quality and creativity are the reasons why consumers grant luxury brands their trust, why they are inspired by them

So, print is a natural place to belong for luxury brands – they share similar values. Print stands for substance and meaning. In the same way it takes time to craft a luxe product or experience, print offers a precious time of lean-back to people; it develops trusted POVs and offers a safe environment.”

Source: LVMH/Moët Hennessy’s Global Branding & Media Director Véronique Louise. 2019

Touch and physicality

Pages must be turned, ink and glue can be smelled, the sheen of paper valued, binding touched, weight felt, spines appraised, texture gauged, embossing lingered over. Time has been taken to achieve these sensory experiences.

Discerning UHNW’s want to see and touch beautiful products. Touch of course can affect our emotional, physical and intellectual responses, so a luxury brand book’s tactility builds a physical connection with consumers - which also reinforces the premium quality message.

A book’s physicality also delivers the luxury brand mantra of authenticity. It is a world of colour-rich, high-resolution, handmade, inked glory.

It is screen free, and it is real.

Control and creation

Books allow luxury brands to control the storytelling. These can be presented without the filters of other media outlets – especially social media or content that has to be SEO based. (Sites are becoming homogenised in a way that offers little brand differentiation or emotional pull to the product)

Not in a superficial way, but in a manner and style that reflects what affluent, intelligent, successful HNWs want.

Source: SO Creative Studio

Gain and weight

A luxury coffee table book carries a certain weight, both physically and metaphorically. Unlike lighter, more disposable, books these are crafted with heft, making them feel substantial in your hands. This creates a sense of permanence, reinforcing the idea that this beautiful bespoke book is an object of value. The density of its pages speaks to the richness of its content. The simple act of lifting a book conveys importance and gravitas.

Size and presence

Luxury coffee table books are often oversized, designed to command attention and create an imposing presence in any room. The large format allows for high-resolution imagery to be presented in stunning detail, turning each page into an immersive experience. The generous dimensions make these books the perfect centre piece for table, gracing the shelves of a library or a private reception area for your VIP clients , inviting guests to leaf through their pages and engage with their content. Their very presence signals an appreciation for beauty, knowledge, and refinement.

(Source: SO Creative Studio)

Awe and joy

A well-produced coffee table book is a visual feast. Stunning photography, high-quality printing, carefully curated layouts. We speak of beauty, prestige, discernment, elegance, and grandeur in their purest forms. Done well, bespoke custom books are like objets d’art. Whether minimalist, modern, opulent or baroque, the design reflects the identity of the luxury brand – or individual - producing it.

More than a book

Unlike digital media, which is fleeting and ephemeral, a beautifully crafted coffee table book - a phrase that does not do justice to the experience - a tactile pleasure, a journey through imagery, and a statement of sophistication. It can endure. It can become a treasured brand asset or possession, passed down through the ages.

At its best it is a nuanced relationship between words and images, with each complementing and enhancing the other in conveying meaning and evoking emotion.

Source: Anew/ So Creative Studio

We design, write and print bespoke coffee table books

SO Books is where we copywrite, design, produce and print luxury coffee table books.

SO Books teams us with our colleagues at SO Creative Studio, in a shared passion for all things luxury, including custom coffee table books.

Our book design service offers seamless end-to-end book making services. From initial strategy, depth market research and content creation right through to book design, printing and fulfilment.

We have over 25 years’ experience working with global luxury brands across a wonderfully diverse range of market sectors. From art galleries, museums,architecture, property and interiors through to jewellery, B2B professional services, private investors and private family businesses including royalty.

Commissioning a bespoke coffee table book is the perfect opportunity for luxury brands and individuals to present valuable insights about their inspirations, achievements and legacy.

To learn more about our approach, the service we offer, printing using sustainable print solutions, multi-language and transcreation opportunities – see here.

Or get in touch if you want your luxury brand marketing to deliver an emotion unlike anything else.

Recent related blogs you might enjoy:

Designing coffee table books for luxury brands - read more here
Luxury custom books - read more here
Luxury brand marketing advice - read more here
What's in the luxury brand marketeer's playbook? - read more here
Nature as designer for luxury brands - read more here

Behind the beauty of luxury

Many successful luxury brands are rooted in origination tales of deprivation and loss. Founders’ responses to what random awfulness life throws up, makes their businesses more human, interesting and real. Truth, courage and humanity are qualities, as one gets older, that are as valuable as any luxury product.

Our latest article for Luxury Briefing magazine examines the matter. It's the thirteenth in our series and you can read all the others by following the links at the end of the article.

Behind every beautiful thing, there's some kind of pain, Dylan said. You may ask yourself what has this to do with luxury. Who wants reminding that the exquisite stitching of your Chanel bag Cotton & Wool Tweed & Gold-Tone Metal – only £8,420 - might have a place in a conversation about hardship and suffering.

Or, as you uncork your Château Lafite Rothschild, 1er Cru Classé, Pauillac, you remember that picking grapes involves much physical hard work, people bent over repeatedly for long days. At £1,349 a bottle, kinda takes the edge off, I know. But thinking about the creation of beauty – an essential component of luxury – can be humbling.

Many successful luxury brands are rooted in origination tales of deprivation and loss. ‘T over T’ old Fleet Street journalists used to call it. Triumph over Tragedy. Lives mixing resilience, determination, and an amazing ability to overcome. You will know many of the names, but maybe not the details. Their responses to what random awfulness life throws up, makes their businesses more human, interesting and real.

Truth, courage and humanity are qualities, as one gets older, that are as valuable as any luxury product.

Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel. Born 1883 to a poor family. Her mother died of TB when she was twelve and her father abandoned her and her siblings. She was sent to an orphanage, where she was raised by nuns. There she learned to sew, and to appreciate the simple elegance of black and white.

Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin, born in 1777 married François Clicquot at twenty-one. Her husband died six years later. Her husband's death may have been suicide. Madame Clicquot had to work. She ended up creating a wine that was different to others: less sweet, uncloudy, with smaller bubbles called champagne…

Joseph-Armand Bombardier, grew up experiencing brutal Canadian winters where mercury dips to below zero. Roads closed due to snowfall, people were isolated, essential services out of reach. He was obsessed with how to help people move through this difficult environment, because of a personal tragedy: his son died during the winter when there was no way to get him to a doctor in time. JAB went on to create the snowmobile, trains and aviation jets.

Thierry Hermès was born in 1801 in Germany but fled to France after his family was killed during the Napoleonic Wars. He started life as a refugee and orphan. The displacement and loss must have massively traumatic. Despite this he set up his first workshop in 1837, producing horse saddles for European nobility…

Salvatore Ferragamo was born into a poor family in 1898. By eleven, he was working in Naples as a shoemaker’s apprentice. The family struggled to make ends meet and moved to the US. And shoes were the way out. Becoming known as the "Shoemaker to the Stars," he returned to Italy, his soul saved by founding a shoe company in Florence in 1927.

Yves Saint Laurent was born in Algeria in 1936 with a troubled childhood marked by bullying. He moved to Paris for its fashion but was drafted into the army for the Algerian War of Independence. Military life caused a breakdown, leading to hospitalisation in a psychiatric asylum where he underwent ECT followed by lifelong issues with mental health, addiction, and depression – not to mention other consuming issues such as fashion and beauty.

Louis Vuitton was born in 1821 in a small village in France. His mother died when he was ten, and his father remarried soon after. Feeling neglected by his stepmother, Vuitton ran away from home at thirteen, walking nearly 300 miles to Paris. He became apprenticed to a box-maker and packer…

Henry Royce, born in 1863, faced severe poverty after father’s death when he was nine. His father's failed business left the family poor and Royce had to leave school to help the family. He worked as a messenger, a telegraph operator, and later apprenticed as an engineer. His talent for that led him to start his own business, and a friendship with a Charles Rolls…

Hans Wilsdorf, born in 1881 in Germany, was orphaned by the age of 12. Both his parents died within a short time of each other, leaving Wilsdorf and his siblings in the care of relatives. Hans managed to get apprenticed at a Swiss watchmaking firm and in 1905, founded something called Rolex.

Enzo Ferrari, born in 1898, lost both his father and older brother to the flu in 1916, leaving him to deal with the emotional and financial fallout. An obsession with motorsport saved him.

Similar themes that all show how difficult starts in life spurred the protagonists on to success. Their businesses reflected the very qualities they had in themselves: innovation, perseverance, and integrity. Plus, the vital ingredient of months and years of hard work.

Maybe the act of creating something beautiful, something of quality and made to endure is a way of bringing some good into the world. It is an optimistic thing to do. It says life is worthwhile. After all, these brands outlived their creators. The founders’ lives had value.

Luxury places huge value on who, why, where and how things are made. Heritage, provenance, craft, ritual, memory creators, experience-givers. Contrary to perceptions, luxury can also offer lessons for every life.

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

The importance of being reassured

(Image credit with thanks here)

Reassurance is an underrated, but hugely important quality in luxury. Few luxury brands delve into the emotion of making people feel less worried, less doubtful, safer - and in a curious way NOT standing out from crowd.

Our latest article for Luxury Briefing magazine examines the matter. It's the twelfth in our series and you can read all the others by following the links at the end of the article.

There is a shop in my area offering private health care. Bypassing the UK cash-strapped public health system, it is a luxury indeed. Interestingly, and rather appositely the shop displays an endline outside under its brand name: ‘Specialists in Reassurance’.

Which set me thinking about what an underrated, but hugely important quality, reassurance is in luxury. Few brands delve into this emotion: of making people feel less worried, less doubtful, safer, more contained - and in a curious way NOT standing out from crowd. Everything luxury is supposed not to be. Is this heresy?

However, relaxing in the opulent, spacious interiors of Aman Venice, sumptuous and sensuous amidst Rococo artworks, or reclining in the back seat of a Bentley Mulsanne with its hand-stitched detailing, hand-finished wood veneers, plush carpeting and ambient lighting, you feel a strong protective arm around you. Both are wonderful spaces unruffled by the turbulent world outside. Elegant escapes of good comfortable living, of dignity and importance. They are consoling, glamorous, dedicated to perfection. How reassuring can you get?

If you brandish your Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Offshore 42mm platinum watch which weighs in at a huge 346 grams, the heft of an average paperback, or look forward to hearing the solid, heavy, reassuring click/thud sound from your Rolls door as it shuts, you’d feel safer than most.

This is reassurance derived from timelessness and quality. A luxury product by definition must be well designed and crafted with the finest materials and workmanship known to humanity; and from that comes a unique, intangible, embellishment of how people feel.

A definite upgrade in longevity, safety and comfort. In tough times, wealthy or not, many people feel uncertain. Luxury buyers want to be reassured that they are investing, emotionally as well as practically, in something timeless.

Take the reassuring smell of aged leather with its hints of smokiness and woodiness, and sense of history and nostalgia, as if it's telling a story of its own. Its smell can trigger memories of a first jacket, a first wallet, a leather-bound book, or the interior of an old car, all wrapped in a comfort blanket of familiarity.

Cashmere. Brunello Cucinelli points out that a cashmere knit ‘is like a book. It is something to save and go back to time after time. It is the feeling of an embrace.’

Tweed has a hand-made, honest quality and a rich, comforting texture. For many, touching it conjures up images of heather scrubland, wet afternoons and cold air. It evokes the British climate more clearly than any other fabric. (Though why you’d want to be reminded of a wet, miserable, grey day in a traffic jam on the M25 escapes me).

Swing a solid handbag like the Gucci Dionysus small GG shoulder bag. Only £2,400. It features a hefty, polished metal clasp – well actually a ‘’textured tiger head closure referencing the Greek god Dionysus, who in myth is said to have crossed the river Tigris on a tiger sent to him by Zeus’. Surely having a Greek God on your side adds to a sense of security.

In electronics, the Sony Xperia Pro-I’s build combines a metal frame with Corning® Gorilla® Glass Victus®. So solid it needs three trademarks.

On the home front there’s a reason why the rich characters in books always ‘slip between the sheets'. If they’re Frette, one does. Their linens have been everywhere, from the altar of St. Peter’s Basilica to the dining car of the Orient Express, to Royalty throughout the ages. A finest long staple cotton story and a complex process of “gassing, washing, mercerising, ironing and purging”. But you get a good night’s sleep. Dreams not included.

(And, for fabric-interested people, mercerising means treating cotton with a chemical so that the fibres are strengthened, take dyes better, and often acquire a soft shine).

I feel tremendously reassured with the weight, handling and size of my Sabatier. The blade curves up towards the tip so you can rock it when slicing, and it has a beautiful, grained olive wood handle adding a kind of primitive back-to-earth feel.

Brands have used reassurance before. Older readers may remember Stella Artois’ ‘Reassuringly Expensive’ campaign which ran from the 1980’s to 2007. Its objective was to turn the negative of higher prices into a positive. So, they told people that by being pricier, their brew was better than cheaper ones.

Pol Roger is doing the same thing now. They are on a scarcity/quality strategy and are apparently ‘Reassuringly hard to find’, though taking a full-page ad on the back of the magazine makes it a lot easier.

The best luxury brands create desire by understanding what makes a consumer’s heart beat a little faster. Right now, solid, grounded, aspirations may have as much value as a unique virtual experience, or a Snapchat filter that lets customers see your new collection in augmented reality.

As Coco Chanel said, "Luxury must be comfortable, otherwise it is not luxury."

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

What luxury means

Even though Italian writer Cesare Pavese gave us this undeniably wise comment that ‘everything is a luxury, starting with being in this world’, rather basically we still need to define what luxury should mean.

Our playbook reads as follows: craftmanship, beauty, design, perfection, exceptionalism, exquisite aesthetics all backed by obsessive founding beliefs, and possibly a culture and values rooted in a very specific local past.

Ideally a luxury brand founder story about an innovator beating tough economic times or hard personal circumstances. Or a contemporary ‘David versus Goliath’ brand narrative featuring a young entrepreneur wanting to do better than the established big guns.

Founder stories are important. By celebrating them, a brand can show consistency and, as a result, trust.

Luxury means authenticity. Credibility and honesty help make a brand unique. The marketing world, framed by eco-consciousness and the lack of trust we have in so many other areas of our lives, demands transparency.

Building brand authenticity takes various forms: like using nature to signal quality, commitment, and resources from faraway places using rare raw materials; traditional craftsmanship to signal heritage; and sincere stories of innovations, originality and sustainability.

And history is important in luxury. Compared to others, luxury brands are unusual in this one metaphysical sense as their ‘birth’ is more crucial to marketing than most. ‘Founded in...', 'Established in...', and 'Since...' are core features of much messaging and logo design..

Luxury brands always get the language right. We like words as opulent and crafted as the products we are selling. Everything should taste delicious, be sumptuous, lusciously fragranced, handcrafted, timeless, exquisitely finished and made to last forever.

We like to get the aura and ambience right. We understand how the cues of art, history and culture ennoble brands and customers. To create the right aura, you must be as real and pure as possible. Think art galleries or five-star hotels.

Lastly and most obviously, know thy customer. UHNW’s and HNW’s are a famously hard-to-reach niche group. Market research is an essential part of any serious company’s marketing plan. It dictates brand strategy, informs resource allocation, and helps brands understand their consumers.

Though quantitative market research (usage and attitude studies) has always been with us, going beyond the numbers has always interested us – and is especially relevant for marketing luxury brands.

Anew luxury brand and research consultancy strives always for deeper insight into human behaviour, and the experiential part of being a luxury brand consumer– not just the process of buying, but the actual experience of owning and consuming a product/service. And understanding the context surrounding consumers when they make their choices.

We want to know the role of emotions, feelings, moods, and other affective aspects of consumption. It matters in luxury brand marketing.

Get the right luxury brand experts to help

Whether it is insights from market research, luxury brand strategy development, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, luxury copywriting, online and offline content or coffee table books we are London-based luxury experts.

We help companies - such as Peninsula Hotels, Bombardier, Universal Music, Boodles, and Hatch Mansfield - increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

We are particularly adept at working directly with luxury brands, business owners, start-ups and entrepreneurs who are committed to sustainability, outstanding quality and craft.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief

Make your brand marketing luxurious

(Feature image credit with thanks here)

The writer Peter York said

"Luxury is a business model. If you are a luxury brand, the thing that you make is the brand”.

He makes a good point. Because, in luxury, the distance between the functional value of a product and the symbolic value of a brand is the greatest in comparison to any other market category.

Brands’ painstakingly, beautifully, created presentations of desire, style, quality, craftsmanship, authenticity, zeitgeist and consumer understanding can contribute massive value. Brand marketing, in itself, gives the status and aspiration that luxury consumers look for.

Rarity, excellence, and high prices have to be justified to discerning UHNW and HNW audiences. If you are in wine, fashion, jewellery, cars, private aviation, hotels, hospitality, entertainment, superyachts, or travel your customers want exclusivity and quality.

Sometimes they want the cutting edge of innovation and style.

(Image credit with thanks here)

Sometimes they want reassuring comforts of nostalgia, reassurance, and old comforts. Sometimes they want luxurious escape. The psychological drivers of luxury are wide ranging indeed.

There are various luxury marketing strategies that brands - and their luxury brand consultants - use. And they must be executed in stylish, relevant, ways to increasingly sophisticated global audiences.

Here are some that have worked through the ages:

Creation stories

Luxury brands need creation stories. We have the original, the only, the newest, the oldest, the rawest, the rarest, the most hard to get, the most stylish, the purest, the tastiest…..

Many stories and narratives are based on craft. Practically, symbolically and psychologically the act of making something permanent, something beautiful, in an all-too-often ugly, impersonal world has always been valued.

Founder stories

Many brands have impressive beginnings. Themes usually feature humble artisan roots, triumph- over- tragedy stories, skilled brave entrepreneurism, ‘Questor’, or ‘David/Goliath’ archetypes. Good ones last for ever and help keep legacy brands alive as LVMH understand well. The recent Widow Clicquot film is a fine example.

(Image credit with thanks here)

Emotion

The spectrum here is wide of course but good market research can unearth a brand’s deeper triggers and help companies how to articulate the right desires and aspirations. Sharing a brand’s values and beliefs with like-minded people is powerful.

Exclusivity

Of course. A sense of community has always been strong and people -more than ever – want to belong. They want to share/show off/reassure themselves throughout the various life stages with brands that reflect their values and interests. UHNW brands can make customers feel special and important by offering, for example, limited edition products, bespoke services, or unusual retail locations, or invitation - only events.

Interestingly Pol Roger are currently running scarcity/quality campaign using the endline ‘Reassuringly hard to find’.

Make memories and experiences

It’s how luxury bricks n’ mortar retail is reinventing itself. The conventional shop is being reframed as theatre, as drama, using spaces that offer value beyond their products or services. e.g. immersive environments, tailor-made offers, or one-off experiential events. People can talk about them.

Extend

Brand collaborations introduce customers to shared brand values and image beyond their own and creates newsworthy content.

Brand image creation

It is hard to do imaginatively and consistently. It means taking a macro and micro approach, solid brand propositions, deep consumer understanding, thoughtful management, creativity that reflects the craftmanship, care and quality of the brand, and the sensitive positioning of all communication touchpoints, like advertising, product design, visual identity, customer service, social media, retail placing and experience.

High prices

Cost itself is a tactic. High prices can create a superior image, talk value, and prestige positioning. Some may remember Stella Artois’ ‘Reassuringly Expensive’ campaign which ran from the 1980’s to the 2000’s. Its objective was to turn the negative of higher prices into a positive. So, they told people that by being pricier, their brew was better than cheaper ones.

Think deeper

For all marketers, the job has got tougher. Media fragmentation, multiple stakeholders, pressure on budgets, instant accountability, job insecurity, consumer fickleness, economic austerity, supply chain instability ….to name but a few.

In fact, the very idea of luxury has been overused to such an extent as to sometimes be virtually meaningless.

Nevertheless, luxury brands have flourished successfully throughout history because, more than any other market sector, its owners and managers understand that meaning means monetisation. That luxury brand marketing is about selling emotions, stories, connections more than just the product. And a little luxury makes people happy.

It means thinking harder about mankind. After all, the world doesn’t truly need another watch, bottle of wine or piece of jewellery.

But people want luxury. We all need our dreams. We all long for better. Most of us look up to that bigger house on the hill, to the mountain top.

(Image credit with thanks here)

We buy luxury brands assuming they will express what we may not be able to say in words. Great luxury brands can reflect our best selves, lets us create a persona we want to be, and have a uniquely personal story we wish to tell or show.

As Fats Waller put it in 1930:

"It ‘ain't what you do, it's the way that you do it. That’s what gets results".

And results are what Anew, the luxury brand agency, delivers

Whether it is insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites, we are London-based luxury experts.

We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

Luxury is seclusion

The UHNW travel industry has made seclusion a luxury. In our latest article for Luxury Briefing Magazine we explore how privacy and escape from the coarse excesses of the world is becoming more desirable. Full text below.

Billie Holliday didn’t feel so good about being alone. She sat in her chair, filled with despair. ’There's no one could be so sad, with gloom everywhere, I sit and I stare, I know that I’ll soon go mad’.

Doubtless we’re all going mad with the way things are.

But in fact, being alone, wanting a little seclusion, some privacy and escape from the coarse excesses of the world is becoming more desirable - a luxury.

If scarcity is one of luxury’s core values, and true seclusion however temporary, is scarce; then a little seclusion is indeed luxury.

I feel a change coming on. People will increasingly want an escape from tech and the burdens it brings. I am no Luddite, but being info-bombed, AI aided, text stressed, platform pressured… I look around and the weight is heavy. People will pay for experiences that moves them away from all that. Oh, I know the switched off mobile is a futile dream, but there are places for those who desire deluxe decompression.

The UHNW travel industry is one luxury sector that has figured this out years ago, offering beautifully remote walled gardens, in villas, on islands, at resorts, up mountains, over the sea, down the valleys to the well-heeled. Ditto the owners of Edmiston or Burgess superyachts, or Bombardier or Gulfstream planes. Exquisite detachment, one step beyond the gaze of others. Not so much turn left on the plane, as turn wherever you want, as you own the whole thing.

I have just returned from the North Pole courtesy of our friends at Secret Atlas. They run amazing expedition micro cruises in isolated locations. And the Arctic is definitely a place to ponder these matters. It’s Nature at its most extreme.

Profound, wondrous, timeless. Being up there alone in the freezing white wildness reminded me that the world is mightier than we are. That we are frail, precious, that we are temporary, that we have to more graciously bow to things greater than ourselves.

That ‘everything is a luxury, starting with being in this world’ as Italian writer Cesare Pavese said. And it’s calming that the mobile doesn’t ring and the email ping.

Being far from the madding crowd can be seen as counterintuitive to luxury brand-building which thrives on the opposite - exposure and connection. Exposure these days is supposed to be Good. Whole professions are devoted to ‘getting the truth out’.

The media, the entertainment industry, writers, artists, lawyers, psychotherapists, doctors, historians… and rightly so. Sarah Igo’s fascinating ‘History of Privacy in Modern America’ speaks of the conflict between exposure and reticence as a story of positive gain for society, not a loss.

There are luxury brands that connect with solitude and exclusivity. As luxury shifts from pure materialism to unique experience, there is now no shortage of exclusive, secluded adventures including luxury tours to the North/South Pole, private safaris or glamping experiences in wildernesses.

Aman Resorts offer hotels and resorts located in remote island retreats and mountain hideaways. Four Seasons Private Retreats say it in their name. Bulgari does Italian luxury getaways-from-it-all. Rosewood offer Ultimate Escapes. One&Only do one-off resorts and private homes ‘handpicked for their extraordinary beauty and cultural charm.’ I’d be more than happy to test the claim.

Let’s not forget the digital detox retreats where guests surrender their mobiles to immerse themselves in nature and mindfulness. Like Camp Grounded in California whose off-the-grid weekends are popular. Or Ritz-Carlton Reserve’s Disconnect to Reconnect phone-free hotels offering quantum healing, yoga, mandala art and sound therapy. Yup, the seclusion business works in many ways.

The acclaimed psychiatrist Anthony Storr explored the value of spending time alone in his famous book ‘Solitude’ where he pointed out many of history's creatives were by nature or circumstance, often solitary. He mentions brilliant scholars and artists - from Beethoven and Kant to Henry James to Wittgenstein. Bob Dylan and The Band decamped to Woodstock, getting back to the garden to reinvent rock with serious songcraft and organic musicianship. Virginia Woolf famously believed that a room of one's own, a space for solitude, was essential for creativity.

Escaping the madness is one definition of luxury. Another way of looking at it is wanting the time and space to enjoy luxury simply secluded.

Honestly you’re better off alone if you want to caress and smell the Bridge of Weir® finest leather hide of your Aston Martin seat, savouring rawhide ‘sourced from the finest Scottish beef herds, processed with the softest and purest of Scottish water’. Incidentally, as this column appreciates the finer details, only the finest heritage breeds are used like Charolais, Limousin, or Galloway and Aberdeen Angus. If that doesn’t bring on the quiet smile of satisfaction that you belong to a super-class light years beyond the hoi-polloi, I don’t know what will.

The most glamorous film star of her day, Greta Garbo, famously said ‘I want to be alone’ in Grand Hotel (1932) and, though it was 92 years ago, she was on to something.

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

Why does nature inspire so much creativity for luxury brands?

In todays’ eco conscious world, designers are tapping nature’s imagery more than ever. In our latest article for Luxury Briefing Magazine we explore why the energy, power and excitement - violence even - of the natural world continues to be designers’ go-to Muse in the luxury brand playbook. Full text below.

Van Cleef & Arpels’ and Graff’s butterflies, Cartier’s Panther, Boodles’ Raindance, Faberge’s eggs, Jaguar’s cars, Mulberry’s tree, Dolce & Gabbana’s leopard prints, Lacoste’s crocodile, Hermès’ horse, Chaumet’s flowers, Lamborghini’s bull, Ralph Lauren’s polo horse. Le Coq Sportif’s rooster, Porsche’s stallion, LVMH’s Cloudy Bay, innumerable fashion collections … the list is endless.

Nature, as a source of creative inspiration, sounds old news, a cliché, but it isn’t. Why is it so enduringly, if not profoundly, part of luxury brand DNA and why is it so important this continues?

To feel the real energy, power and excitement - violence even - of the natural world takes a certain design sensibility, a kind of grace, an understanding. So, here’s to the luxury brand designer, and the creative director and their constant, vital, Muse: plant life, jungle life, flowers of life, trees of life, aqua life, animal life… superior aesthetics, beauty in its purest form. Breathtakingly intricate designs that span majesty and delicacy in the eternal cycle from bud to bloom, youth to old age, opening to closing.

What source material! What sources of energy and struggle!

Frank Lloyd Wright said, “Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you.” Surely advice today, that’s as good as it's ever been for any budding luxury brand designer.

When luxury designers focus on the sights and symmetries of nature, they can show the life-giving qualities of the world at its best. That is brand depth.

I admire Jacqueline Karachi, Cartier’s creative director; she once told the FT how her respect for nature underlined her work: she talked about her search for natural proportion, detail and timelessness. Designs always began with natural stone which must be approached with humility, because the stone is perfect. She wanted to be at the level of the stone, to enhance it, to be of service to it and to find its right harmony.

Van Gogh, famously, also got the power.

‘Blazing light, red earth, blue sea, mauve twilight, the flake of gold buried in the black depths of the cypress, archaic tastes of wine and olive, ancient smells of dust, goat dung and thyme, immemorial sounds of cicadas and flute. A current of energy where the moon comes out of eclipse, the stars fire the sky, the ocean heaves, and the cypresses move. A richness of surface as though the life of the landscape is bursting.'

(Source: R. Hughes. Shock of the New).

Now I see an even greater need for luxury designers to turn to nature for inspiration as technology reshapes the world. Luxury needs the deeper perspectives of nature and more awareness of the environment’s fragility. As we all know, it’s under threat. With eco – consciousness at the heart of every brand’s purpose, the use of nature in its offer and design will be more about necessity than aesthetics. Since Nature is at the centre of the ecological/cultural/political conversation there is a greater need for design and imagery to celebrate it.

Maybe the fact that we talk about nature so much is revealing. It shows how far we have removed ourselves from it. Maybe tech has done terrible damage by unbalancing the relationship between Man and Nature.

Maybe the fact our world is now in so many ways unattractive, we crave more reminders of the natural world.

Natural being the operative word: one of the other reasons Nature is such an inspiration is the sheer emotional range and creative flexibility that comes from it. It can be so much. From quiet tenacity to primitive vibrancy.

From sadness to joy. Chaos to order. Slow to fast. Simple to complex. Dark to light. Change, always change.

I think of Turner’s or Constable’s clouds. Paintings of nature's most fleeting element, these are attempts to capture transitory energy, light, atmosphere, and movement; nothing is ever fixed, or in one place. As in life…

Nature has also one huge practical asset: an enduring design principle at its core, where proportion meets perfection: The Golden Ratio. A mathematical model when used in design creates a balanced, harmonious, aesthetically pleasing image.

It comes from the Fibonacci sequence, a naturally occurring number sequence found everywhere from the number of leaves on a tree to the shape of a seashell.

The Golden Ratio was used for the Pyramids, the Parthenon, Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling, Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa and many more.

Nature is such an obvious inspiration to draw upon you’d think there was nothing new to say about it.

Easy to stick a flower on a dress, a tree on a wine label. Harder to really make it meaningful. Nature’s imagery has been so debased over time with sunset n’ dawn cheesy chocolate box dreck. The real past masters kept the faith though.

A few weeks before his death Cezanne said he was becoming more clear-sighted before nature; although he did not have the long-lasting colouring he still wanted, the idea that Nature itself was endless suggested that it was paradise, and that comforted him.

Well, I know animal logos sure ain’t paradise. But, amidst the ugly visual chaos and confusion of everyday life, where nature is rapidly receding, any nature-inspired design thinking that joyfully reminds us of the human world is surely welcome.

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

Luxury is good

Life is tough. Celebrate the little pleasures that it sometimes brings to us. In an ugly, discordant world, a little luxury in life is good if you can afford it.

Our latest piece explores why beauty, elegance, timeless high quality, durability and a little self-indulgence can be good for you. It's the ninth in our series of ‘Brand Matters’ for Luxury Briefing: the renowned international magazine for the luxury industry.

You can read the full text below.

What’s so funny about beauty, style, elegance, timeless high quality, durability and a little materialist self-indulgence?

In an ugly, discordant, world a little luxe in life is good if you can afford it. Life is tough. Celebrate the little pleasures that it sometimes brings to us. Yes, it has its excesses, its critics, its disapproving moralists, finger-waggers and righteous do-gooders - and that is how some people think of it.

You know the headlines: rocks-off jewellery, super-size me homes, tank cars for the fleet, customised private jets with interiors in the wife’s favourite colour, a little island somewhere off the beaten (tax) track, a Monet tucked away for the investment never to be seen, the extremes to which personal power and whim can be indulged, the enlarged appetites for every pleasure mankind can devise. I know. We can go on.

But there is a strong case for good. We can sleep easy.

I recently came across David Hume's essay "Of Refinement in the Arts". He was a famous Scottish Enlightenment philosopher and historian in the 1700’s. Old school indeed. He thought about luxury.

In the essay he considers its role and impact on society. Like the Monkees, he’s a Believer. But only in moderation. Too much and it leads to "vicious luxury"(i.e. societal decay). Hume sees luxury as a driving force behind cultural progress and the development of the arts. So, he’s our man. He’d be an LB subscriber.

Executive summary in four quick SEO, dopamine friendly, SM points: (Incidentally, if Hume was alive today, he’d be an avid SM user. He’d probably be doing TED talks, the literary festivals, a guest DJ gig once in a while for Insta, a podcast teamed with his opposite number, say a cobbler, and a side hustle as a Guardian art critic.)

He says luxury plays a crucial role in cultivating refined taste in people. You get an appreciation for aesthetics. He says luxury contributes to the progress of society by promoting a more sophisticated, civilised way of life. As people become more refined in their tastes and manners, society experiences cultural and moral improvement. He says luxury stimulates industry and that the desire for it keeps people busy leading to economic prosperity. He says as people buy more aesthetically pleasing, products, artists and innovators want to create works to meet those demands.

I love his idealism: he thinks if you have skilful luxury artisans and craftsmen like weavers or ship carpenters (the star designers of his day) you also should get great philosophers and politicians. Excellence in one area should result in excellence in other areas - like politics. We wish.

I think we agree that any perfection we show in creating luxury brands in our own Age of Anxiety certainly doesn’t extend to government.

We don’t party like it’s 1799.

Admiration for the perfect good is of course a luxury brand mantra. Obsession with Excellence or Saving Civilisation – it may be a debate that never goes away, but I applaud the ones that do Good:

The Hermès Birkin Bag: hand-stitched leather that takes days to complete by a single artisan.

Patek Philippe's techniques pushing the boundaries of mechanical engineering. Not just telling time, owning a miniature work of art.

Lamborghini’s attention to detail and precision engineering, incorporating cutting-edge technology.

Chanel and Dior’s meticulous craftsmanship, hand-stitching, embroidering, and embellishing garments to perfection.

Akoya pearls: divers in Japan free dive for the finest specimens, braving strong currents and limited visibility.

Japanese Gyokuro: the most luxurious type of green tea whose plants are shaded before harvest.

Kobe Beef: Wagyu cattle are massaged daily to improve blood flow and marbling in the meat.

Peninsula Hotels: luxurious properties in some of the most remarkable destinations in the world, inimitable service, delivered by dedicated team members with a passion for their calling and an intimate knowledge of their cities.

Bombardier jets: engineering excellence, delivering unrivalled comfort, performance, technology and the smoothest ride. Venetian Murano glassware: hand-made blown using special methods, techniques, and tools from silica, soda, lime and potassium melted together in a special furnace. Invented in Venice over 1,000 years ago.

Truffle Hunting: Highly trained pigs or dogs sniff out these rare and valuable fungi. Saffron: The world's most expensive spice comes from the delicate crocus flower. Harvesting is done by hand, requiring immense patience. Sunseeker superyachts: luxurious interiors, onboard amenities and the exclusivity of floating palaces.

Finally, Lexus point out, with a psychologist’s help, in their inhouse magazine, what luxury does to us:

‘When you experience something luxurious, your brain responds by releasing ‘feel-good’ neurotransmitters, like endorphins and dopamine, which give you that strong buzz of enjoyment as well as the increase in self-esteem associated with belonging to an exclusive group.

With your senses heightened, you may also become more aware of your surroundings, noticing small details such as the smoothness of a steering wheel, or perfume. This physiological reaction can be intense, but as the experience continues, this strong initial reaction evolves into something more soothing. Once we are settled into enjoying the experience, we will have physiological changes associated with relaxation and contentment’.

So, good all round then.

A little more on Anew - a London-based luxury branding Agency

Anew’s two founders deliver: insights from market research, strategic brand thinking, new brand names, luxury logo design, messaging, online and offline content, coffee table books and luxury brand websites. We help companies increase brand profitability through sharper insights, distinctive propositions, creative ideas and faultless execution.

To get in touch do drop us an email. We'd be delighted to meet for a coffee, either face-to-face or virtually to discuss your brief.

Escapism

Power

Serious, mature, intellectual

Craft and heritage

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A father’s letter to his son on entering the luxury business. The Tradesman. London 1814.

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The natural fit between print and luxury

Substance and meaning

Touch and physicality

Control and creation

Gain and weight

Size and presence

Awe and joy

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We design, write and print bespoke coffee table books

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