We developed four trend guides to support the launch of Baby Evie, working closely with Hasbro’s Demi Patel and the wider team. As specialists in baby and toddler categories, we valued the opportunity to create a series of themes that were clearly differentiated yet cohesive for cross-category application. The final concepts successfully balanced theme, colour direction and trend relevance – while remaining age appropriate and aligned with the brands identity.

What design trend caught your eye most this year?
The fruit and vegetable trend! Rooted in themes of locally farmed organic produce, it celebrated freshness and played on slogans in a visually engaging way. It was interesting to see how brands applied this commercially, creating strong, relevant work. Overall, it felt like a powerful trend and used effectively by brands within the industry.

What design or business development from outside licensing influenced you the most in 2025?
The obvious one – and the most influential – is the continual evolution of AI, both in business and in design. From an art licensing perspective, we have seen a resurgence in our clients looking for original hand-rendered pieces… Something that has real depth and texture – and a story behind the piece of work. People are looking more and more for that human connection.

In our business, we have started to look at ways we can integrate AI into our workflow, not in the design of a piece of work itself but more in collating information, trends and layout presentations.

“From an art licensing perspective, we have seen a resurgence in clients looking for original hand-rendered pieces.”

What development in licensing and design took you most by surprise in 2025?
The sudden surge of mega-deals and ownership shake-ups has been one of the biggest surprises… The breaking news of Netflix and Paramount negotiating to buy Warners Bros is huge, potentially giving one company control over huge swathes of content, brands and distribution-power. How that will impact our industry remains to be seen, but I do worry about the effect on smaller independent creatives.

What has been the biggest design or business challenge you faced in 2025?
One of the biggest challenges has been trying to maintain high-quality creativity with tighter budgets and shorter lead times. It’s essential for our business to deliver design solutions that are both impactful and commercially viable. This has required us to create clearer strategies, stronger collaboration with clients and a more strategic approach. While doing so, we needed to ensure we remain innovative while meeting cost and timeline. This has strengthened our ability to work more strategically, with efficiency.

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Stephanie Griggs, Creative Director, Studio Griggs
A range that really made me smile this year was the Lush x SpongeBob SquarePants collection. It had everything that a good brand partnership should have in my eyes: solid purpose and shared brand values – the range raised awareness for the SpongeBob SquarePants: Operation Sea Change initiation and was 100% plastic free – creative synergy and great product innovation… The Krabby Bathy was a 3-in-1 bubble bar, soap and bath bomb that in my four-year olds words “made bath time cool”.

I’ve loved seeing Lush build out their licensed ranges as a staple strand of their offering. This year saw a number of other great collaborations for them including Barbie, the Super Mario Bros movie and Netflix’s Stranger Things.

Paula Rich, Owner, Dot Dash Design
My top choices among licensed products this year are undoubtedly the collaborations with The Met in New York. Expanding on their prior successful partnerships in the realms of fashion and beauty, they launched six captivating fragrances in collaboration with Pura. Each scent draws inspiration from the museum’s most iconic spaces, such as The Temple of Dendur. These exclusive products are available at The Met, their online store and through Pura’s website.

I was particularly impressed with the thoughtful approach taken in the collaboration. Recognising the strong connection between fragrance and memory, The Met sought innovative ways to convey the museum experience through the senses, bringing a fresh dimension to the appreciation of art.

Being a stationery enthusiast, I also loved their collaboration with Papier. The newly unveiled collection of planners and diaries for 2024 is exquisite, showcasing artwork from The Met’s archive. This includes a rejuvenation of art nouveau book covers designed by Margaret Neil Armstrong.

Ben Cox, Creative Director & Co-Founder, Fraktal
My favourite licensed product this year is definitely Hasbro’s Haslab Ghostbuster Proton Pack. I’ve been a lifelong fan of Ghostbusters and as a child I dreamed of owning a Proton pack. Alas, I had to make do with the Kenner Real Ghostbusters version to fill the gap… Fast-forward 35 years and Hasbro answered the call of Ghostbuster fans everywhere by manufacturing a full-size screen-accurate replica through their crowdfunding Haslab platform. The campaign was a roaring success and thousands of fans are now the owners of their very own nuclear accelerator. With all credit to Hasbro, this a great example of a company listening to fans and going the extra mile to deliver a product beyond the expectations of consumers.

Oliver Dyer, Founder, Skew
Our team is closely following fan brands, community-led product development and social selling like TikTok Shops. Sides by Sidemen – in partnership with Hero Brands – fits very much within this emerging phenomenon. Hero Brands, the company behind German Doner Kebab and Island Poké, is moving extremely fast to turn Sidemen’s immense following into a sustainable, long-term brand. It’s impressive and whip-smart how they quickly turned the feedback received from the delivery-only model into a carefully selected chain of restaurants. The location, menu, product design and marketing are a case study in where licensing is heading… Fan brands are the future, and Sidemen have a hyper-engaged focus group of over 20 million who are only too happy to help shape their brand extension offerings.

Anita Castellar, CEO, FanGirl Consulting & Brand Management
My standout for 2023 is McDonald’s bringing back the beloved retro mascots. I always regretted that McDonald’s didn’t keep these iconic characters relevant throughout the years and put them into the archives. Their resurgence not only creates a nostalgia play for kidults, but also an opportunity for a shared moment with those of us who have children. Now we can pass along our love for these sometimes-mischievous characters to next generation. My personal favourites are the adult Happy Meals and the Loungefly bag collection for the win!

Ian Downes, Director, Start Licensing
It’s been interesting to see food and drink brands embracing licensing more frequently and in more depth in recent years. Brand owners like Unilever have led the way with a range of licensing deals with brands such as Marmite. These always seem to be well chosen and created with care. There’s no rush to market, rather a strategic roll out of products. One recent deal that I particularly admired – and one that is a great example of developments in the sector – is McDonald’s working with Galaxy to create a Galaxy Caramel Hot Chocolate. It is well presented in store and represents a very effective bit of NPD. It’s well timed in the run up to Christmas – a season when consumers are looking for festive treats and experiences – and is a great way for Galaxy to activate their brand while strengthening their brand equity. It’s also a good example of a focused licensing deal. The fact it’s a limited edition helps build more engagement and opens the door for further NPD in the future. It is a great example of what is going on in the FMCG licensing market at the moment – and also what is possible when brand owners work together in a focused way.

Sophie Bloomfield, Creative Director & CEO, SBC
2023 has been yet another year of awesome consumer products. It just shows the creativity out there, and the demand for great products. Barbie X Zara collection must get a shout out because wow – just wow! I don’t think Zara has ever given so much attention and marketing support to one brand, let alone a licensed brand. The in-movie look approach to the range was a great creative direction and the sales results proves this was a fantastic collection.

My second choice is Bird & Blend’s Wallace and Gromit tea range. So adorable, especially the packaging and how they executed the brand in store. Great work Aardman!

This next choice has only just launched. Mattel’s Uno collection with Province of Canada. They have literally made Uno into a cool art brand – I want it all! But in all seriousness, this is a tough feat of design. Often classic brands aspire to being a collectable art and lifestyle brand but fail. Uno and Province of Canada have executed this range effortlessly. This is down to the balance of design aesthetics, the choice of products and styles – and not ‘over-designing’ the collection.

Last one! A new favourite is the boygenius collaboration with Brooklyn-based Jewellery brand Catbird. I first saw Catbird’s work via their collab with The Met in 2020 and have been impressed by their work ever since.

David Born, CEO, Born Licensing
Barbie has had such an incredible year, with the world turning pink in July as Greta Gerwig’s film generated over $1.4bn at the box office. However, the product that really caught my eye this year would have been my choice regardless of the film success: the Barbie Stevie Nicks doll. Steve Nicks is one of my favourite performers and when I saw this product, I was super impressed. Mattel absolutely nailed it, with 27-year old Stevie’s iconic bohemian dress and signature tambourine inspired by the 1977 album Rumours. The launch generated a lot of mainstream press and, from what I’ve read, it sold out very quickly. Mattel are brilliant at ensuring that Barbie continues to appeal to a broad customer base… Collaborating with Stevie Nicks is a great example of tapping into the older demographic who grew up listening to Fleetwood Mac and Stevie Nicks.

Tim Collins, MD, The Brand Director
My vote is for Bearbricks. These are large scale figures in different materials covering the usual superhero, sci-fi and classic toy characters. They’re really nicely produced and are – of course – not at all subtle. It truly shows that ‘merch and pop culture’ isn’t a niche market any longer.

Will Stewart, Founder & CEO, The Point 1888
The Powerpuff Girls x Nike SB Dunks are fucking awesome in every way. No idea if it’s gonna be successful, but hey in our industry what does successful licensing mean anyway? Eyeballs, inches or sales? All are valuable regardless of objectives or success. Our industry can do it just cos it’s cool… We can look at a worldie like this and be proud we work in such a cool industry.

Rob Hutchins, Editor & Community Manager, Products of Change
My pick has to be Lush x SpongeBob SquarePants. This was exciting from the get-go. Launched to coincide with Plastic-Free July as part of Paramount’s SpongeBob SquarePants Operation Sea Change campaign, this was a partnership that heralded a new first and a new dawn for licensing. Quick to market with fresh products, Lush is a dynamic outfit of creatives – and it’s everything licensing loves. Bold, pioneering, with a captured pop culture audience on the global stage – all while being kind to the planet through sustainable practices and regenerative processes up and down the value chain. Lush presents a purpose-driven new era for licensing. And the SpongeBob collection presents a creative new application of the industry’s best-loved IP. Besides, show me anyone not happy jumping into a bathtub with a Krabby Patty after a big night out and I’ll show you a liar!

Susan Bolsover, MD & Founder, Lightbulb Licensing
My choice has to be Barbie. While I am a Sindy girl through and through, Mattel knocked it out the park this year! What I found so brilliant was the way in which traditional consumer products and promotions blended seamlessly with movie marketing to create a truly immersive event – and a memorable pop-culture moment. From the core toy product through the extended licensing categories – shout out to the apparel category in particular –to the movie poster selfie generator and the Malibu home promotion with Airbnb to name but a few… Barbie changed the landscape of movie licensing forever and showed how with joined up thinking around a brand, you can deliver something truly outstanding… Something that consumers of all ages around the world can engage with.

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Using botanical illustrations from the Museum’s archives, we handpicked a selection of images that complemented one another. We then created additional watercolour assets in a similar botanical style and turned them into pattern repeats for gifting and homewares.

It looks great.
Thanks! We were thrilled to see how these assets were brought to life on products showcased at BLE, especially Joanie’s “Monkey’’ print blouse, which quickly became one of their bestsellers. If you look closely, you’ll notice a subtle but charming monkey with a cheesy grin within the pattern, guaranteed to put a smile on your face when worn!

Museums and galleries also used our “Deep Sea” print to create a stunning jigsaw puzzle.

Additionally, we thoroughly enjoyed collaborating with several classic evergreen brands, catering to diverse age groups from babies and pre-schoolers to adults. Our inhouse designers’ art styles complemented these projects seamlessly. And we have received very positive feedback from the teams.

When taking on a new project, do you have a set research process in place?
Thorough competitor and market research are crucial at the outset of any project. It’s equally essential to fully immerse ourselves in the brand we are working with.

One effective approach we adopt is watching a TV show or a new film multiple times, preferably with a child or someone of the target age range, to gain valuable insight into their reactions and perspectives. By observing what makes them laugh and identifying tag lines that resonate with them, we can create graphics that cater to their preferences and sensibilities.

This strategy is especially effective when designing graphics for fashion and home. To gain more feedback from a child’s perspective, we are also exploring the option of conducting focus groups at local schools.

How easy is it to stay on brief? Do you find things can evolve beyond the initial brief when you get started?
We take pleasure in pushing the boundaries and exploring new ideas at the outset of each project. This is precisely why we place so much emphasis on the research stage. Our customers appreciate our ability to propose suggestions that are often unexpected, refreshing and perhaps not initially included in the brief.

The Alphabet project we executed for the Natural History Musuem is a prime illustration of this. Though the original brief entailed designing artwork for the Alphabet, we found ourselves so inspired that we created graphics for t-shirts centred around the theme of environmental conservation. These graphics were eventually incorporated into a range for John Lewis.

On that, one of your core areas of experience is designing for the apparel market, which of course is still a buoyant part of the licensing market. Have you seen other product categories emerging that you have to incorporate in your design work?
Certainly, our designs are tailored for a diverse range of product categories, including apparel, stationery, gifts and home goods. Interestingly, even when we create guides for a particular product category, they often find their way onto completely different product types.

For instance, our Tatty Teddy guides were primarily fashion-focused – but were extensively utilized on greeting cards. Similarly, our Natural History Museum guides have been repurposed for homewares, fashion, jigsaw puzzles and even chocolate bars!

You have also just worked on classic and evergreen brands like The Gruffalo, My Little Pony and Peppa Pig. These brands are well known, successful and very active. How do you find and identify a fresh design angle for them?
We have a strong affinity with evergreen brands as they allow us more creative freedom to explore new and unconventional ideas. A recent example of this is our baby collection for Tiny Tatty Teddy, where we developed a jungle theme and dressed Tiny in a lion suit – the results were adorable!

Another project we worked on last year was an apparel range for The Gruffalo, designed exclusively for Primark. Despite having a limited colour palette, the range had a striking and distinctive look that was both simple and beautiful. We firmly believe that sometimes, less is indeed more!

Outside of your design work for IP owners, you have developed a licensing business creating and selling your own patterns. Can you tell us more about this and how you identify gaps in the market to develop new designs for?
Our process for in-house work is similar to that of our licensed work. We begin by creating mood boards at the start of each season, drawing inspiration from our trend analysis and market research. These mood boards serve as the foundation for our collections.

Additionally, we collaborate closely with a few of our clients in the United States, who regularly share their trends with us. This allows us to design to a specific brief for their product areas.

We have seen our designs prominently featured in Christmas and seasonal collections, as well as new product categories such as ceramics, gift wrap, and even umbrellas! Moreover, our designers have been developing their unique styles in parallel, which has opened up opportunities or us in the NFT space and beyond.

Finally, if you could invite a couple of designers out for lunch, who would it be and why?
If we had the opportunity to invite a couple of creatives out for lunch, we would choose Natasha Dyson and Sophie Tea.

We would love to meet Natasha Dyson to discuss her experience with NFTs, copyright ownership and licensing. It would be great to learn from her insights on these topics.

We’re also fascinated by Sophie Tea, who has made a significant impact in the art world. We’ve been following her on Instagram and have even invested in one of her NFTs. It would be inspiring to chat with her and gain some insights into her marketing strategies. Ultimately, it would be fantastic to meet her in person.

Great stuff. Huge thanks again – let’s tie-in again soon!

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We spoke with Dot Dash Design’s Paula Rich and Christa Mavroudis about creativity, collaboration and how the firm’s own print and pattern work influences how they create for brand partners.

Paula, Christa, it’s great to catch up. Let’s start at the beginning – how did Dot Dash Design come about?
Paula Rich, Owner, Dot Dash Design: Dot Dash Design was founded over 12 years ago by myself, Christa and Nick. We all worked together at a supplier to M&S at the time. Nick and I had started to work on a new project that involved creating style guides. The diversity of working on different creative projects was really exciting and introduced us to lots of different brands and brand owners. There were lots of changes happening at the company at the time, so we decided to take a leap of faith and go for it alone!

That was in 2009, right at the start of the recession – so we didn’t know if we were doing the right thing, but it seemed to work! Because we’d already built relationships with a few licensors, we hit the ground running and got our first few projects.

Dot Dash Design has evolved through the years and Nick has since left the company. We continue to grow and have a team of dedicated designs and illustrators that share our creative vision.

Can you recall one of Dot Dash Design’s first projects?
PR: It was with the BBC on a Charlie and Lola project. Our background in fashion and textiles was a perfect fit to create a fashion guide for the brand. Funnily enough our expertise in fashion and textiles – which stems from our manufacturing background – has been an integral part of our growth as a business and has influenced our move into the art licensing space.

“We’re always thinking of ways to reimagine brands and character art in a way that stems from what we’re doing with surface patterns.”

Talk us through your approach to design?
Christa Mavroudis, Director, Dot Dash Design: The key factor in anything we design is in first understanding the client’s customers and working backwards from there. Every design project is different and before we put pencil to paper – so to speak! – we like to really understand who we are designing for, where the opportunities are for our clients and really making sure we have total clarity on the brief.

We have certainly found that putting in the homework before you start designing always leads to a more successful outcome.

When it comes to creating style guides, do you prefer working with brands that have a clear framework – like characters, worlds, movies, TV shows – versus brands where you’re creating elements pretty much from scratch?
CM: It really doesn’t matter how far down the process a client is when they approach us. In fact, I would say we thrive on the challenge of variation in our projects.

One of the great benefits of taking on such diverse projects aside from it being fun is that it really helps to sharpen your team’s skills and builds up their confidence to tackle any challenge.

For example, a few years ago we were asked to create three style guides for a theme park in Moscow that hadn’t been built! It was a huge challenge – creating character concepts from scratch just based on a traditional Russian fairy tale or an idea for one of their attractions. The project evolved so much throughout the process, it was a huge learning curve for the team and a brilliant experience.

We sometimes see IP move into areas that seem – on paper – quite left-field. How important is it for brand owners to let their IP breathe and stretch into new areas?
CM: Absolutely, you have to! There are so many licenses out there, you have to evolve to stand out.

We are always exploring new poses and graphic techniques for our key clients by pushing the boundaries in terms of trend and product direction whilst still being authentic to the brand’s core values. Brand owners that are open to trying new things and being innovative seem to do really well in our experience.

“There are so many licenses out there, you have to evolve to stand out.”

You guys are prolific designers and have worked with brands for years. Do you think the licensing industry recognises the value and the contributions of designers?
CM: When we see ranges that we worked on win awards, we obviously feel really pleased for our clients and it really is a positive validation that we delivered quality work. I think it would be great for our industry to recognise the design and creative talent that helps propel what we do forward, not just at Dot Dash Design but across the board. It’s an interesting one!

It sure is! Now, are there any recent projects you guys have worked on that we can put a spotlight on?
PR: As you know it’s difficult to talk about our recent and current projects due to confidentiality, but we are working with some great new partners and are generally very excited about the year ahead.

Recent projects that we can talk about include the Alphabet Style guide for the Natural History Museum. We created brand new illustrations of the alphabet, based on different aspects of the Museum, all realised in three versions to accommodate printing restrictions for various product types. Graphic concepts were educational and included subtle environmental messaging. The guide has been successfully used on apparel ranges in John Lewis and has recently seen its way onto paper products with a range of cards at Moonpig.

CM: We have also been working with a number of publishers recently and although we can’t reveal much at this stage, some of the brands we’ve worked on include The Gruffalo, Elmer and Peter Rabbit which have been an absolute joy to work on. There are so many exciting book properties doing more and more in licensing and we feel so privileged to have been chosen to work with the best of them.

Absolutely. Now away from your work with brands, Dot Dash Design also creates your own print and pattern for licensing as Dot Dash Studio…
PR: Yes! We started working on our own print and pattern collections about five years ago and have slowly built up a comprehensive collection which we sell and license worldwide.

We have exhibited at Surtex, Blueprint, Printsource and Evolution Amsterdam and we absolutely love it! Most of our work is seen on product in the US but we have recently seen some of our work filtering through to UK stores such as TK Maxx – we would love to see more of this which is one of our key objectives for the next year.

CM: Creating our own prints is a great counterbalance to working with brands. It lets us execute on ideas we have had but may not have been applicable to any licence brief. Having a clean slate and the freedom to explore ensures you don’t get stuck in your ways and we certainly encourage our designers to do print and pattern work whenever they can.

Great advice. Before I let you go, how do you guys fuel your creativity?
CM: From day one of Dot Dash, we have always encouraged everybody in the company to take time and learn new skills and to stay on top of what’s new and coming next. There is a wealth of information today whether it’s on YouTube, Instagram or online classes. I personally love watching videos by other artists that inspire me and that is inspiration I can take forward to one of our own client projects. I really love creating digital art at the moment.

PR: We subscribe to some of the best forecasting tools including WGSN and get inspired there – but Christa’s right, we’re driven by learning new things. Social media and Instagram are also great for inspiration. I also believe that the work we are doing on print and pattern side, has given our licensed work a boost because we’re now always thinking of ways to reimagine brands and character art in a way that stems from what we’re doing with surface pattern.

CM: That crossover is one of our key strengths and is something we can offer that’s unique. It gives us a different perspective than most.

Guys, this has been fun. Thanks again! And I should add, readers can check out more of your work at www.dotdashstudio.co.uk and on Instagram here.

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