01 Process · The 21-day sprint
Twenty-one days. Fixed fee. One studio.
A sprint is not an agency engagement with the monthly invoice stripped out. It is a deliberately small unit of work — kickoff workshop to shipped identity system — designed for founder-led brands raising their first check, not their fortieth. One studio, in one room, on one calendar.
What a sprint actually is
What you get when you book a sprint.
Included, every time
- A half-day kickoff workshop with the two founding partners in the room — no account director, no strategist between you and the design team.
- One complete identity system: wordmark, secondary marks, type pairing, a four-color palette, motion principles, and a written voice guide.
- Packaging partners on call: fourteen manufacturers in our network, 1.8M+ units produced across previous sprints.
- Final deliverables in source files, print-ready, and a 30-minute Loom walkthrough so your team can run with them on Monday.
Explicitly excluded
- No retainers, no monthly minimums, no "always-on" invoices. The fee is the fee.
- No scope creep. The brief we agree on Day 1 is the brief we ship on Day 21.
- No middle managers. The partner who pitches the work is the partner who designs it.
- No guaranteed revenue outcomes — we design the system, you run the business.
The four phases
Twenty-one days, chapter by chapter.
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Day 1–3
Brief
A half-day workshop in the Brooklyn studio (or over Zoom) with founders Mara and Tomás in the room. We pressure-test the category, name the enemy, and lock the deliverable list. By the end of Day 3 you have a signed brief, a fixed fee, and a fixed calendar.
Delivered by Day 3: signed sprint brief, fixed-fee quote, shared Notion workspace, kickoff recording.
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Day 4–10
Design
Two design directions built in parallel. Mid-week you see rough sketches; by Day 10 we present two finished identity systems in the studio, on the wall, at full scale. You pick one. There is no "round three" — we go deep on the chosen direction.
Delivered by Day 10: two complete identity directions, one selected and locked.
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Day 11–17
Build
We production-engineer the chosen system: every lockup, every color value, every typographic rule, every packaging dieline. Our in-house packaging partners mock up structures. Motion principles get storyboarded. Nothing is left as a "we'll figure it out later."
Delivered by Day 17: production-ready master files, packaging prototypes, motion principles, voice guide draft.
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Day 18–21
Ship
Final handoff: every asset in source, print, and web-ready formats. A 30-minute Loom walkthrough. A 60-day support window for the inevitable "wait, what hex is this again" email. We book a check-in at Day 90 to see how the brand is landing.
Delivered by Day 21: complete shipped identity system, Loom walkthrough, 60-day support window.
By the numbers
312 sprints shipped. 96% on time. 71% book a second.
client projects completed, 2019 to 2024
of sprints shipped on or before Day 21
of clients in 2023 booked a second engagement
average project value across the last 24 months
92% of clients in 2023 arrived by direct referral. The studio does not advertise.
The fine print
The fine print, in plain English.
What does the fixed fee actually cover?
The fee covers everything in the signed Day 3 brief: the workshop, the two design directions, the chosen system's full production engineering, packaging prototypes, motion principles, source files, print-ready files, and the 30-minute Loom walkthrough. The only line items billed separately are third-party production costs — for example, actual printing plates or stock photography licensing — and those are quoted in advance.
How many revision rounds are included?
Two rounds of refinement on the chosen direction, plus the structural changes that come out of the Day 10 presentation. Anything beyond that is a scope change and gets scoped as a new sprint. We do this on purpose: it keeps the deadline real.
When is the deposit due, and how is the rest billed?
50% on signing the Day 3 brief, 50% on Day 21 delivery. We invoice through a standard platform; wire, ACH, or card. No payment plans, no net-60, no "we'll catch up next quarter."
What happens if the deadline slips?
It hasn't on a sprint yet, but if it does — because of us, not because the brief changed — we credit the next sprint at 25% of the original fee. We put this in writing at kickoff. The 96% on-time figure is not a marketing claim; it is the actual rate across 312 projects.
Who actually attends the kickoff?
The two founding partners — Mara Lindqvist (ex-Pentagram) and Tomás Reyes (ex-W&K) — plus one senior designer who will be on the project for the full 21 days. The person who pitches the work is the person who designs the work.
Next step
Twenty-one days starts now. Book your kickoff.
Three questions, one short brief, a reply within two business days. Fixed fee quoted before you wire a dollar.