Origin®
Brand Studio, DubaiDubai

Journal

Journal

Journal

Why Reform's wordmark lives on the hem.

Why Reform's wordmark lives on the hem.

Why Reform's wordmark lives on the hem.

Reform cuts its garments from salvaged denim. The mark had to survive being cut too.

Reform cuts its garments from salvaged denim. The mark had to survive being cut too.

Reform cuts its garments from salvaged denim. The mark had to survive being cut too.

Topic

Identity

Published

Reading time

3 minutes

Written by

Portrait of Mara Hollis, Design Director

Mara Hollis

Design Director

·

Origin®

Topic

Identity

Published

Reading time

3 minutes

Written by

Portrait of Mara Hollis, Design Director

Mara Hollis

Design Director

·

Origin®

Topic

Identity

Published

Reading time

3 minutes

Written by

Portrait of Mara Hollis, Design Director

Mara Hollis

Design Director

·

Origin®

A woman in a white top, a pleated denim skirt and patched jeans stands in a dark studio in front of large embossed REFORM letters.

A Reform campaign still: patched jeans, a pleated denim skirt and the embossed mark.

A woman in a white top, a pleated denim skirt and patched jeans stands in a dark studio in front of large embossed REFORM letters.

A Reform campaign still: patched jeans, a pleated denim skirt and the embossed mark.

A woman in a white top, a pleated denim skirt and patched jeans stands in a dark studio in front of large embossed REFORM letters.

A Reform campaign still: patched jeans, a pleated denim skirt and the embossed mark.

Reform rebuilds denim. Offcuts and salvaged panels from old jeans become patchwork jackets, lace-up jeans and pleated skirts. No two pieces match, and none of them start from a clean roll of cloth.

That changes where a logo can go. On most labels the mark sits on the chest, a back pocket or a patch at the waistband. At Reform those places move. A back pocket on one pair of jeans becomes a panel on a jacket the next month. Anything printed there gets cut.

Looking for the edge that stays

We laid twenty finished pieces on the long table at Lime House and looked for the part every one of them shared. The pockets moved. The seams moved. The waistband was sometimes a waistband and sometimes a strap.

The hem stayed. Every garment ends somewhere, and Reform finishes each end with a turned, stitched edge. It is the last seam sewn and the first one a customer touches when they roll a cuff or turn back a sleeve.

So the wordmark went there. A woven label the width of a finger, folded into the hem seam on the left side. It shows when a cuff is rolled and hides when it isn't.

The open boot of a dark saloon car packed with pale blue Reform mailer boxes, above a white RE.FORM number plate.

Reform mailer boxes in a car boot, one mark on every lid.

A logo on Reform's clothes has to survive scissors. So we stopped asking where it looked best and asked where it would last.

Portrait of Mara Hollis, Design Director

Mara Hollis

Design Director

·

Origin®

Making the name survive

A label that small sets hard limits. The weave has a fixed grain, so thin strokes break up and tight counters fill in. We set REFORM in a heavy, rounded type on one line and tested it at the loom's real size, not on a screen. Three versions failed before one read cleanly at arm's length.

Then we cut it. Reform's team trims hems when they rework a piece, so we sewed the label in, cut through the garment above and below it, and washed it twice. The name held, because it sits inside the seam allowance, not across it.

One mark, two shapes

On the hem the name runs on one line. On stickers, cards and the denim patch it stacks as RE / FORM. Both shapes use the same letters, so they read as one brand on a mailer box or a sleeve.

Brandon put both shapes on a single page of Reform's guide, with the label printed at its real size beside them. The team that packs the orders checks each new batch of labels against that page, not against a file on a screen.

The clothes will keep changing. The label is the one part of them that won't.

Portrait of Mara Hollis, Design Director

Mara Hollis

Design Director

·

Origin®

Leads the identity work. Decides what gets cut, and explains why in writing.

Leads the identity work. Decides what gets cut, and explains why in writing.

A lit digital poster for Dendezeiro stands on a metro platform, with a train blurred behind it.

Up next

Identity

30 July 2026

Designing for a station wall, not a phone.

Out-of-home gets read in two seconds from twelve metres away. Here is what survives that distance.

Portrait of Carlisle Stevens, Art Director

Carlisle Stevens

Art Director

·

Origin®

A lit digital poster for Dendezeiro stands on a metro platform, with a train blurred behind it.

Up next

Identity

30 July 2026

Designing for a station wall, not a phone.

Out-of-home gets read in two seconds from twelve metres away. Here is what survives that distance.

Portrait of Carlisle Stevens, Art Director

Carlisle Stevens

Art Director

·

Origin®

A lit digital poster for Dendezeiro stands on a metro platform, with a train blurred behind it.

Up next

Identity

30 July 2026

Designing for a station wall, not a phone.

Out-of-home gets read in two seconds from twelve metres away. Here is what survives that distance.

Portrait of Carlisle Stevens, Art Director

Carlisle Stevens

Art Director

·

Origin®

Start from the origin point.

Every brand we build begins with one conversation. This is where yours would.

Book a call

Start from the origin point.

Every brand we build begins with one conversation. This is where yours would.

Book a call

Start from the origin point.

Every brand we build begins with one conversation. This is where yours would.

Book a call