Ensemble pair poetry and pragmatism in their placid identity for luxury bedding company Santi

Exploring the typographic balance between poetic form and pragmatic execution, Manchester-based design studio Ensemble have developed the identity, packaging, applications and name for luxury bedding company Santi. Visually representing the wandering thoughts that cross your mind as you fall asleep, Ensemble decided to use Pangram Pangram’s Hatton and Swiss Typefaces’ Suisse BP as dynamic and thoughtful typographic tableaus – utlising the contrasting type pairing to introduce an elegant tension between the two styles. “We chose Hatton for its contemporary take on old style characters,” Ensemble tell us, “and Suisse BP for its crafted utilitarian aesthetic,” they add, creating the circumstances for either the sans or the serif to take prominence depending on the expressive nature of the application. Taking inspiration from the striking imagery of sunrises and sunsets, the dynamic typographic treatment is then paired with surrealist CGI creations, and a subsequently peaceful colour palette. “We created gradients that are referenced from the four stages of the night,” Ensemble explain, manifesting in Civil Dawn, Sunrise, Nautical Dawn and Astro Dawn landscapes to sit alongside and enliven the monochrome hues of the typography. Sleep-focused diagrammatics were then crafted by Ensemble to bring together the abstract and the efficient, resulting in a stark yet compelling bridge between the two and the elementary pattern derived from their simple forms. “We were drawn to the scientific nature of these diagrammatics,” they conclude, “and when juxtaposed with the expressive typographic poetry it became an interesting combination.”