Bambuk studiо: who are we and what are we about?

“We did not appear to make a lot of money. Our Bambuk studio appeared because we saw that the local market is not offering a comprehensive approach to brand design and communication. And we just wanted to make better.”

Bambuk studio is the Ukrainian creative studio that works in several directions. Working for 17 years in the Ukrainian market, they gained unique expertise in branding, web design, strategy, and production. For more than 9 years the studio has worked on an international level. It has clients almost from each continent, who consider Bambuk studio to be their “secret weapon” because of the unique approach they use in work and how deep they go during understanding the client and the market it works on. It allows them to operate in areas where they do not yet have the expertise and explore the world by finding how diverse design methods can help brands become better. 

Design that arouses emotions: how does it work

The Bambuk studio’s primary approach to its work is with a vibrant design concept. “It’s better, to talk through emotions and let people feel the brand. The vibrant design may change the world. It can simply change the way the business will be viewed and how it will see itself. When we begin our cooperation with companies, we want to find that peculiarity. It’s great when branding specialists want to help their clients to identify themselves better, and understand what they aim at and which value they have for others.

That is why during our partnership we go through a self-identification process with our client. The best way is to be fully aware of their work, goals, and activities. In turn it helps us to adjust our design to business goals and make it flexible, so we will be able to manage it. Combining creative ideas and their control is a key. Our team wants to inspire companies by vibrant design and everyone around and to transform the whole world through emotions,” — says Oles Kucherenko, co-founder and creative director of the studio. 

The vibrant design is about combining creative ideas with innovations. The idea and unique approach they use in work occurred long ago and now is a concept and slogan of the studio. The primary purpose is to convey an emotional state, which is not as easy as it may seem, and be able to manage it. Design that may touch your feelings requires much preliminary work, team brainstorming, and deep analysis. It is not about changing “the clothes which the brand has”. It is about defining its identity, changing the depth and self-awareness of business.

Another crucial point is to create a design in accordance with the company’s mission, vision, goals, and business strategy. The branding specialists need to take into account the context they are working at and also be flexible. Moreover, the true win-win situation is when your work will also fill with the business goals of the client and complete them. 

These are the main milestones of conveying emotion through the screen. “Brand is an emotion. What are we doing here? We are managing those emotions to communicate with our audience. For example, you know when a child draws a picture. It may be complete nonsense, but you may catch yourself staring at it and suddenly begin to feel something. You have feelings because the drawing is sincere. That is the sentiment the branding specialists are looking for.

Bambuk studio is driven by a strategy that helps us to make a touching design that evokes something. That is the reason sometimes we struggle to explain how we work or which approaches our team has. At the beginning, we worked relying mostly on our feelings, without thought-out strategy or plan. Now due to the gained experience we developed our methodology, which combines ratio and irratio together with creativity and analytics. It gives us a unique opportunity to create emotions and to manage them”. 

Knowing details, getting insights, and having an integrated image help the studio to feel the brand and build communication to approach people’s feelings. Such an approach is extremely valued among foreign clients. “Our studio is sometimes called ‘a secret weapon’ by them. I don’t want to explain it by saying that we are special, use unique instruments or are the best. I think it is because we are ready to fully commit to our clients in terms of work.

We put in a lot of effort to understand them and are prepared to make a call even if it’s midnight in Ukraine but still a workday in the United States. But sometimes a perfect match may not happen, which is totally normal. Not everyone is ready to review their work completely and make a change. Our approach also requires a lot of work. Made by the client, primarily in terms of being ready to take a risk, to go deep into the company’s identification, and appeal to the emotional side of the brand. We, in advance, are not ready to work within a standard framework.”

Bambuk studio works in completely diverse spheres, among which are the semiconductor industry, high-tech companies, gaming, NFT space, and so on. Thus their mission is targeted more at their clients. They pursue a goal to help companies form their self-identification through work with the studio and inspire others.

A little marvel for corporate branding   

One of studio’s strategies and particularity is development of mascot, which is later associated with a particular brand. It is a creation of a specific hero or character that goes beyond traditional branding and establishes solid emotional connections with the brand’s target audiences. Mascots help build brand identity, make touching stories, or create general communication. They are widely regarded as among the most potent and efficient tools for branding. Even though they are the trickiest to create and manage appropriately. Moreover, mascots are always there, without sleep, rest, or vacation. They work 24/7 to help your business grow its profit, share the market, build customer loyalty and are flexible to various situations.

“Mascots are also a great way to build a company’s voice and communicate with the audience. One of our clients, a semiconductor company Ambiq, used their mascot hero Nemo. They adapted him to diverse situations on their website, such as Halloween, Thanksgiving, Valentine’s Day, etc. When the war in Ukraine started, they used Nemo to declare solidarity with the Ukrainian nation by adding our flag to the mascot design. It instantly helped people to understand the brand’s position, and it is also about emotions. You cannot simply go past, when you see a small mascot, holding the Ukrainian flag, and representing the whole company at the same time,” — tells Oles Kucherenko.

Moreover, such a strategy helped to communicate the company’s values and interact with its employees and customers through illustrations, various pictures, and products. “People and animals can be mascots also, but we think that particular creatures are clearly more exciting. First, we see people or animals much more often. Secondly, the design of creatures is with cartoons, coloring, fairy tales, our ideas, and memories from childhood. And they are almost all positive. The more non-standard and hyperbolized the image is, the better. Exaggeration is always interesting to consider, because it is something atypical and new. And in fact, a living, realistic character has shown itself well at long distances, in large-scale projects, because it can tell a story, give context, and when the task is to attract attention it is the best option. And it does not depend on the seriousness of the company”.

How did the Bambuk studio change its work after the war in Ukraine started? 

When the full-scale war started, Bambuk studio was also forced to make some changes to their work. Their main principle became helping society and being beneficial because if you do not support a society facing a challenge, why do you even exist as a company?

The Bambuk studio also helped with some charitable initiatives, among which they developed a guide for Territorial Defense Forces of Ukraine. It was about weapon usage and together with volunteers we helped to create the visual materials for the application with first aid instructions TacticMedAid, that works even offline.

Among other projects were stickers designed for the Territorial Defense Forces and prepared infographics about enemy casualties and how many Ukrainian children suffered after the war. In general, our team loves working with projects related to corporate social responsibility. “It is exciting to work on social projects, especially with our clients. Sometimes studio helps charitable initiatives with our services pro bono because we try to help wherever possible and inspire others to follow an example. It is one of the main values of the studio, so Bambuk is excited to find new touching stories where our experience and skills may be useful”. 

The war helped to establish this mission even more. “Here, you may spot the difference between how people work in Ukraine and abroad. Many historical events, some dating back a century, still leave a lasting impact on Ukrainian society, causing enduring trauma. And, of course, they had its influence on us. Ukraine was constantly mocked, our ancestors lived through repressions, famine, and totalitarian politics, and we were always humiliated. That is why today, we, as a nation, struggle with such problems as an inferiority complex. We have this strong idea in our heads that what we create, do, and develop not should, but must be the best. There are a lot of stereotypes about how the Ukrainian and foreign creative sphere works. But we literally have different backgrounds. That is why sometimes it is worth taking a risk and trying to work with the Ukrainian creative industry.

Here we seek to create the product on the highest level, with the best quality, and with a unique attitude. Not because we are the best, but because our internal environment forces us to do so. Moreover, Ukrainians manage to move on despite difficulties thanks to our creativity. In winter, when we had constant difficulties with electricity because of the shelling of critical infrastructure, a lot of people bought generators. We didn’t have a connection, so we ordered Starlink. We didn’t have electricity during the day, so we worked at night.

Ukrainians constantly find new ways to deal with every challenge they face, and only thanks to our creativity we are able to do it. It helps us move forward, become better, be different, and inspire others. That is why we want to try new spheres. We know that we can make them be more alive and full of emotions.”