DESIGN CHATTER
How KEYLAY shows up during crunch time
Dec 04, 2025
Hard deadlines put pressure on everyone, especially you. As the clock ticks down, you still want to produce a marketing piece that’s a quality product and solves a business problem.
The last point is the most important because without a strategy behind the design, it won’t be as effective for your business. However, you can still get the best of both worlds even when there’s a tight schedule.
We navigate this with you by balancing speed with delivering designs that actually help move you closer to your goals.
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Brand audits in 2026: Why reinvent the brand when you can optimize it?
Dec 04, 2025
Instead of “Should we rebrand?” the question for 2026 is, “What marketing initiatives will bring us the most ROI for the least amount of money?”
To answer this question, we’re going to do a little thought experiment.
Imagine owning a factory, and there’s an economic downturn. The last thing you plan to do is break ground on a new facility or buy expensive equipment.
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Inherited Brands
Dec 03, 2025
Satoru Wakeshema’s teenager recently sparked a household debate by rejecting an unfamiliar yogurt brand (better than sneaking out I suppose?) But this is proof that generational brand loyalty is alive and well, and surprisingly fierce. Research shows Boomers stay loyal to a wide range of brands, Millennials layer in values and sustainability, and Gen Z keeps an extremely selective roster, and even judges others by their brand choices. The brands that successfully pass from one generation to the next aren’t the trendiest,
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Why Penguin Sets The Gold Standard For Book Design
Dec 01, 2025
Penguin Books has always understood something a lot of brands miss: typography isn’t decoration, it’s the soul of your identity. From their very first paperbacks, Penguin built a visual language immediately recognizable to readers. As Monotype’s Charles Nix puts it, their consistent visual rules “stripped away impediments to understanding,” proving great typography is really just great communication. No matter the era or printing method, the brand always circles back to the same goal: make reading easier,
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Serifs Went Away. Nostalgia Brought Them Back.
Nov 26, 2025
Have you noticed? Serifs are officially back, and suddenly everywhere! After years of flat design and minimalist sans-serifs, brands are leaning hard into retro, 90s-Apple-style typography. It started popping up in places like the Gen Z-favorite David protein bars, and now even AI brands, like Perplexity’s Comet browser, are going all-in on nostalgic serif fonts. Why? Warmth, personality, and a little dose of “tech used to feel fun.” Some designers say the trend is getting overused,
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Only Real Art Nerds Will Pass This Test
Nov 21, 2025
On the subject of art…the internet is full of quizzes that ask you to match famous artists with their most recognizable works, but where’s the fun in that? We all know the Mona Lisa and Starry Night. This quiz goes deeper, pulling out the wildly obscure pieces that never make it onto trendy tote bags. Think you can spot an artist based on one of their lesser-known works? Give it a shot and see how sharp your art-history instincts really are.
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