Brand Strategy, Rebrand & Identity System | Death by Zero
Client: Death by Zero
Industry: Fashion / Streetwear / E-commerce
Project Type: Brand Strategy, Rebrand, Visual Identity System, Brand Playbook
Timeframe: 4 Months
Overview
Death by Zero was an established fashion brand with a loyal product offering, but its visual identity no longer reflected where the business needed to go.
The existing branding had been created in the mid-2000s and had become outdated across key digital touchpoints. The website, social media assets and EDM communications lacked consistency, creating a fragmented brand experience that made it difficult for the business to present itself with confidence.
The client had known for some time that the brand needed to evolve, but previous attempts had stalled due to a lack of trust and difficulty finding the right creative partner. The challenge was not simply to “refresh the logo”, but to create a strategic and visual foundation the client could believe in, understand and confidently use.
The Challenge
Death by Zero needed a full brand reset.
The brand had strong commercial potential, but the identity system was dated, inconsistent and not clearly aligned across its digital ecosystem. Website design, social assets and EDM creative all felt disconnected, which weakened the overall customer experience and made the brand harder to recognise and remember.
The key challenges were:
Modernising branding that had been in place since the mid-2000s
Creating a more consistent visual identity across website, social and EDM touchpoints
Rebuilding trust with a client who had struggled to follow through on previous rebrand attempts
Clarifying the brand’s positioning, audience and tone of voice before moving into design
Developing a practical identity system that could support ongoing e-commerce and digital marketing needs
Creating a brand playbook that gave the client clarity, confidence and direction
This was a project that required both strategic sensitivity and strong creative leadership. The client needed to feel guided, not pushed.
The Approach
The project began with strategy.
Before developing the new identity system, I brought in a strong marketing strategist to support the brand positioning phase. Together, we worked collaboratively with the client to clarify the foundations of the brand, including audience identifiers, tone of voice, language direction and market positioning.
This strategic phase was essential. It gave the rebrand a clear rationale and helped move the project away from subjective visual preference into a more grounded brand direction.
Once the positioning was clear, I translated the strategy into a new visual identity system that could work across Death by Zero’s key digital channels.
The process focused on building a brand that felt:
More current
Moving the business away from a dated mid-2000s identity into a sharper, more relevant visual space.
More consistent
Creating stronger alignment across website, EDMs, social media and marketing assets.
More ownable
Developing a visual language that felt specific to Death by Zero, rather than generic fashion e-commerce.
More usable
Building a system the client could actually apply across future content, campaigns and communications.
The Solution
I created a new identity system for Death by Zero, supported by a strategic brand playbook.
The rebrand gave the business a clearer visual and verbal foundation, allowing the brand to show up more consistently across its digital touchpoints. The work included visual identity development, brand direction, digital application guidance and a practical framework for future brand communications.
The final system helped bring together:
Brand strategy and positioning
Audience and user persona identifiers
Tone of voice and language direction
Refined visual identity direction
Digital design system guidance
Website, social and EDM brand consistency
Brand playbook for ongoing use
Creative direction for future digital marketing assets
The identity was designed to give Death by Zero a more confident and commercially relevant presence, while still respecting the attitude and energy of the existing brand.
Outcome
The result was a cohesive rebrand that gave Death by Zero the clarity and confidence it had been missing.
After years of knowing the brand needed to change, the client finally had a strategic identity system they could trust and move forward with. The new brand playbook created a clear foundation for digital execution, helping align website design, social media assets and EDM communications under one consistent brand direction.
This project was not just about modernising the look of the brand. It was about rebuilding confidence, clarifying the brand’s voice and creating a practical system that could support future growth.
Project Summary
For Death by Zero, I led the development of a new brand identity system following a strategic repositioning phase. Working collaboratively with a marketing strategist, we clarified the brand’s audience, tone of voice and positioning before translating that strategy into a cohesive visual identity and brand playbook.
The final outcome gave the client a modernised, consistent and usable brand system across digital touchpoints — replacing outdated mid-2000s branding with a clearer, more confident identity built for e-commerce, social media and future brand growth.
