Studio note

Two project slots open from January 2027, and one short editorial slot this December.

Send a brief
Wild WardFreelance design desk
Menu
A long studio desk in late-afternoon light, with an open laptop, stacked notebooks and printed layout sheets.
Wilder Ward · Brand, editorial & site design

One desk, one project at a time, and a written scope before anyone starts.

Independent design for small practices, publishers and teams who would rather brief a person than a pipeline.

The short version

I build the parts of a brand you actually have to use: a wordmark and mark set, a type and colour system, editorial layouts that survive real copy, and page designs your developer can build without guessing. Every engagement opens with a scope note — deliverables, rounds, dates and a fixed figure — so there is nothing to negotiate mid-project.

Start a brief See the three lanes
Working from
A small studio in the Tayside hills, remote with clients across the UK and Europe.
Typical engagement
Two to five weeks, one project in the studio at a time.
Not on the menu
Retainers, ad buying, SEO packages, or logo-only jobs with no system behind them.

Briefs that land well here

  • Identity for a new practice
  • Rebrand with existing equity
  • Label & packaging systems
  • Quarterly journals
  • Annual reports
  • Exhibition print
  • Type & colour systems
  • Site design for handoff
  • Design system documentation

What I take on

Three lanes, each with a defined finish line

Most enquiries fit one of these. If yours sits across two, say so in the brief and I will scope it as a single run with one set of dates rather than two invoices.

01

Brand foundations

For new practices & considered rebrands

We agree what the brand has to do before anything is drawn: who it speaks to, what it must never look like, and where it will be seen most. Then I design the smallest system that covers those places properly.

Deliverables Positioning note, primary wordmark plus secondary mark, colour and type system, layout principles, and a plain-language usage guide.
Working rhythm Four to five weeks. Two directions, then two refinement passes on the one you choose.
You supply A decision-maker who can say yes, and any wording you already trust.

02

Editorial & print

For publishers, programmes & reports

Long documents fail at the seams — the third pull quote, the table that runs over, the page with only two lines left. I design the grid and the awkward cases first, so the rest of the issue assembles calmly.

Deliverables Grid and baseline system, cover directions, styled master pages, image treatment rules, and press-ready artwork with a prepress check.
Working rhythm Two to four weeks depending on extent. Copy should be close to final before layout begins.
You supply Text in one editable file, images at print resolution, and your printer's specification.

03

Site design for handoff

For teams who already have a developer

I design; someone else builds. That only works if the handoff is honest, so you get real content in the designs, every state drawn, and notes on what should happen when the text is twice as long as we hoped.

Deliverables Up to six responsive page designs, a component sheet with states, spacing and type scales, and an annotated handoff file.
Working rhythm Three to four weeks, with your developer in the review from week one.
You supply A named developer or build partner, plus draft copy for the pages that matter most.

How we work

Four steps, and you can stop after the first

The read-in is deliberately separable. If the scope note tells you this is the wrong month or the wrong budget, that is a useful outcome and you owe nothing further.

  1. Step one

    Read-in

    You send the brief. I read it, ask the five questions that change the answer, and write a scope note: deliverables, rounds, dates, and a fixed figure. Free, and yours to keep either way.

  2. Step two

    Directions

    Two routes, shown in context rather than on a moodboard — on the label, the cover, the page. We pick one. Two is a decision; eight is an avoidance of one.

  3. Step three

    Build-out

    The chosen route becomes a working system, with two refinement passes and a short note every Friday so you always know what changed and what is next.

  4. Step four

    Handoff

    Source files, exports in the formats you'll actually open, and a usage guide written for whoever inherits it. Questions stay open for thirty days at no charge.

Scope changes are normal. When one appears, I price it as a short addition with its own dates rather than quietly absorbing it — which is how projects slip and goodwill runs out.

Selected work

Three recent runs, described in full

Short case notes rather than a gallery: what the brief was, what I was responsible for, and what the client could do afterwards that they could not do before.

Design work in progress on a desk: colour swatches, a notebook of sketches and a laptop showing layout options.

Brand foundationsFive weeks

Hale & Thistle, herbal apothecary

A two-person apothecary with forty products and no consistent way to label them. I built a mark that survives being stamped into wax, a two-colour palette that keeps ingredient families legible on a shelf, and a label grid that their own team now fills in without asking me.

Outcome: new products are labelled in-house in an afternoon.

A table covered with printed pages, charts and marked-up proofs during an editorial layout review.

Editorial & printFour weeks

Northbound Review, quarterly journal

Ninety-six pages, four contributors who all write to different lengths, and a volunteer editor doing layout on Sundays. I designed the grid, the six recurring article shapes and the footnote rules, then trained the editor on the master pages over two sessions.

Outcome: the last two issues shipped without design input.

A small team reviewing wireframe sketches and notes spread across a meeting table beside a laptop.

Site designThree weeks

Ferry Lane Bakery, site design

A bakery with a developer already booked and a fortnight to design in. Five page designs, a component sheet covering long product names and sold-out states, and annotations written for the person building it rather than for me.

Outcome: built in nine days with two clarifying questions.

Is this the right desk?

Worth reading before you write

A freelance desk is a narrow tool. Here is where it does well, and where you would be better served by a studio, an agency or an in-house hire.

A good fit when

  • One or two people can make decisions and are both in the review.
  • You want the person designing it to be the person you brief.
  • The work has a real finish line — an issue date, a launch, a print run.
  • You would rather have a small system used properly than a large one ignored.
  • You can live with dates set a few weeks out, because the studio takes one project at a time.

Probably not, yet

  • You need design, build, copywriting and campaign delivery from one supplier.
  • Approval runs through a committee that has not met yet.
  • The deadline is this week — rush work costs you more and gets you less.
  • You want ongoing weekly output; that is a retainer, and I do not run one.
  • The brief is a logo with no system, product or publication behind it.
A tidy studio desk photographed from above: notebook, pencil, coffee cup and an open laptop showing a page layout.

One project in the studio at a time

The practice

Terms in plain words

Wild Ward is one designer, Wilder Ward, working with a small circle of trusted developers, illustrators and printers when a brief needs them. Nothing is subcontracted without telling you first.

  • Fixed written scope.Every project starts from a scope note you have read and agreed. No hourly drift, no surprise line items.
  • Friday notes.A short written update each week: what moved, what is next, and anything I need from you to keep the dates.
  • You own the files.Full rights and source files transfer to you on final payment, including editable originals — not just flattened exports.
  • Thirty days of questions.After handoff, questions about using the system are answered at no charge for a month.
  • One at a time.The studio runs a single project. It is why dates hold, and why the calendar is booked a few weeks ahead.

Questions

The seven I am asked most

If your question is not here, put it in the brief — I would rather answer it before you commit than after.

How is a project priced?

By scope, as a fixed figure, agreed before work starts. The scope note lists deliverables, the number of review rounds and the dates; the figure covers all of it. Nothing is billed hourly, so a slow week is my problem rather than yours.

Payment is split: a deposit to hold the dates, and the balance on handoff. Longer editorial runs can be split across three points instead.

What counts as a revision round?

A round is one consolidated set of feedback from you, answered in one pass by me. Collect comments from everyone who has an opinion and send them together — three separate emails over a week is three rounds' worth of work and only feels like one.

Brand foundations includes two refinement passes after you choose a direction. Editorial and site work include two per deliverable set.

Which files do I actually receive?

Editable source files, plus exports in the formats you will genuinely open: vector logos as SVG, PDF and EPS, raster versions at the sizes you use, press-ready PDFs with marks and bleed for print, and design files with layers and names intact for web work.

Fonts are licensed in your name, not mine, so you are never dependent on my licences.

Do you work with printers directly?

Yes, on request. I can prepare artwork to your printer's specification, check proofs and sit on the email thread with them. I do not mark up print costs or hold the print contract — you pay the printer directly, which keeps the quote honest.

Can you build the site as well as design it?

No. I design for handoff, which is a deliberate limit. If you do not have a developer, I will introduce you to two I have worked with and let you contract them yourself. They price their own work; I take no referral fee.

What if I need something in two weeks?

Sometimes possible, sometimes not, and worth asking. A compressed run means fewer directions, same-day feedback from you, and a rush figure that reflects moving other dates. If the answer is no, I will say so in the read-in rather than promise and slip.

What happens if we stop halfway?

Either of us can end a project in writing. You pay for the stage that has been completed, and you receive everything produced to that point, including source files and rights for what you have paid for. No penalty, no held-back work.

Start a brief

Tell me what you're planning

A few fields and a few sentences is enough to write a useful scope note. You do not need a finished brief, and you do not need to know the budget to the pound.

  • You get a written reply within two working days.
  • If it fits, the scope note follows within the week — free, and yours either way.
  • If it does not fit, I will say so plainly and point you somewhere better.

Your details are used only to answer this enquiry.