Rose-Innes Designs

22/10/2025

🎤 The Voice of Luxury Gin: My Role in Cygnet’s Early Brand Story

Great brands start with discovery, not design.

In 2022, I worked with Katherine Jenkins OBE to help shape the early foundations of her luxury gin, Cygnet. Using my Brand Diamond model, I uncovered her values, motivations, and Welsh identity, and built customer personas to guide the brand’s direction.

What emerged was a vision of elegance, beauty, strength, and authenticity – rooted in her connection to Wales. 🌿

You’ll see it throughout the brand:
💧 Eric Villency’s water-drop bottle, inspired by Welsh streams.
🌼 Daffodils hand-drawn on the cans and bottles.
🍯 A recipe of 22 botanicals with Manuka honey – as smooth as her mezzo-soprano voice.
✨ And a subtle nod to her breakthrough at 22 with Cygnet 22 - and when we started to develop the brand.

It’s been inspiring to see the Cygnet team grow this into a beautiful brand that truly sings. 🎶

For me, it proves again that Welshness adds value – when brands capture identity authentically, they don’t just stand out, they stand for something.

19/10/2025

Beyond the Ordinary — Repositioning Abbey Glass as a Design-Led Specialist

This year, I’ve had the privilege of supporting to bring their new brand to life online. This project wasn’t about simply refreshing a website — it was about shifting perceptions. The rebrand* moved them from domestic and commercial glazing to being recognised as a design-led glass specialist, with the creative strapline of “Beyond the Ordinary.”

My approach is always discovery first. I began by spending time with Angela Worgan to really understand her vision for the business and role of the website; elevating Abbey Glass into the same space as the incredible projects they’ve already delivered for brands like Miller & Carter, The Ivy Asia, Hilton Hotels, Park Plaza and Premier Inn.

My support included:
- Creating customer personas to understand what they needed, then to shape navigation, content, and user flow of the website
- Applying the new brand style across the site, introducing a distinctive diagonal elements and a refreshed aesthetic
- Collaborating with digital specialists to align SEO strategy with content and structure
- Reworking site navigation to make the customer journey clearer and more intuitive.
- Supplying assets and guidelines to the developer, who applied the branding

The result is a website that reflects Abbey Glass’s expertise and ambition — positioning them to win design-led projects. A big thank you to the Abbey Glass and supporting team for trusting me to help guide this transformation.
*Brand design by CMDi

12/10/2025

Enter the stage: with their NEW Blackcurrant Cassis Sorbet. 🍧 🍧🍧🍧

They needed more than just assets for promotion and marketing activities, they needed to successfully launch and position a new product in their range.
Spoiler: They went on to win the Golden Fork Great Taste Award for 2025!!!

My objective?
To help their customers believe they can taste the sorbet before trying it. To evoke a setting before being there, and then to choose it before even knowing the price. Rather than simply showcasing the product, the goal was to evoke a feeling — to transport the viewer into a setting where indulgence meets elegance.

I set out to create a stunning visual story for this product: A background scene of a special occasion: Champagne chilling in silver buckets, gold-rimmed glasses catching the light, a cassis-based cocktail in hand. The sorbet is now more than a dessert — it becomes part of the moment. Through the use of sensory cues — sparkle, texture, and atmosphere — the imagery does more than present ice cream, it tells a story. It captures a mood, an experience, and the promise of taste. This was the art of persuasive design — transforming flavour into emotion, and packaging into storytelling.

If you need the story, the design and the brand assets for your product, drop me a message.

05/10/2025

When I first sat down with the founders of Cattle & Co, I asked them why they were doing this. It became clear very quickly that this was more than opening a restaurant. It was about flavours, meat, smoke, about the patience of slow cooking. It was about the huge Southern Pride smokers they’d shipped across the Atlantic, and the respect they had for the pit-master who trained them.

When I listen to any founder, I try to tune into their wavelength — to understand not just what they want to build, but why. That “why” is the foundation. Once we’ve uncovered it, I begin to see the brand in my head.

Over 20 years ago, I designed the Frankie & Benny’s brand — back when story-led branding was beginning to take hold. Today, authenticity is valued even more. Guests want something real. That’s why I steered Cattle & Co away from clichés of number plates and neon lights, and towards something more honest and elemental. With so many smokehouse brands appearing across the UK, I encouraged them to lean towards the premium end — a positioning that felt true to their craft.

The passion was always there. The challenge was how to turn that passion into something people could sense before they even walked through the door. That is where brand has made the difference.

It gave them clarity of voice to speak their truth.
It shaped the atmosphere.
And it gave them the platform to grow: from an idea into four venues across Wales, with their own sauces, coffees and merchandise.

That’s why Cattle & Co works and what made the difference. Without brand, they would have had a restaurant. With brand, they have something people can believe in.

27/01/2021

What I learned from designing the Welsh Parliament website and my experience of being involved in a high profile collaborative project. 🤓 https://roseinnesdesigns.com/case-studies/welsh-parliament-web-design Method4 Senedd Cymru

31/12/2020

I always enjoy Paul Taylors blogs, this one is a good summary of key points, a short read - worth it.

Happy New Year everyone – these are the five most popular posts I wrote in 2020. Thanks for subscribing and reading Best wishes Paul

08/12/2020

Tre-Rhew’s Cider House & Farm new branding, going well 👏🏻

Well this is exciting! 😍

09/11/2020

Welsh farmer goes from bust to boom thanks to 24 hour milk machine. (Partly due to the excellent branding of course!) Llaeth Beynon Dairy

At the beginning of the pandemic the Llanelli farmer feared for his family's business, but his fortunes have transformed dramatically

06/10/2020

I like this..... "If design is about creating desirable future narratives whether that be an innovative tech product or a behaviour-changing campaign, we need to deeply understand the environmental and social consequences of the design brief. We need to understand the role of design convener, use global networks to share knowledge and use that knowledge to act locally and connect back with our communities" Ella Doran

Designers have an important role to play to help avoid climate catastrophe, write Alexie Sommer and Ella Doran of new environmental collective URGE.

03/09/2020

The last few days my inbox has been making me smile....🤓 And they are all from different clients.

Thank you Michelle. Everyone loves the designs.

Hi Michelle. That's great, let's keep talking.

Hi Michelle, I think they look good.

Great thank you Michelle!

Hi Michelle, Yes good comments thank you.

Good morning Michelle, I have just looked at these designs, I think they look really good 😊

Sounds good we are nearly there Michelle

Hi Michelle, Thanks for sending through. I’ve shown them to a few people & the result to both has been positive.

Hi Michelle, That sounds great.

Hey Michelle great news! We were successful with the tender.