As I put it when I named brat the design of the year, its “omnipresent green brand was developed by the Brooklyn studio Special Offer for Charli XCX. Brat summer was a vibe, and it was embodied by this bold and unapologetic green counterbalanced by a lackadaisical ‘I may have just screen grabbed this font off my phone and resized it’ typeface.”

But while no one could have seen brat coming, exactly, some of its ethos had been in the air for quite a while. We’d heard about a redux of the roaring ’20s coming out of COVID since at least 2022. It just took the right artist, album, and brand to realize the moment.

So what is in the air for brands in 2025? We asked some of the leading brand designers in the world just that question. And what they told us was, while the brat ethos is likely to stick around for a bit, we’re entering an era of visual time-bending and earnestness in messaging . . . that, yes, is sure to involve a healthy dose of AI stepping in, too.

Deliberate discomfort

This year it felt like Charli XCX with Brat Summer and Jaguar appeared from out of nowhere. They have both defied all conventions and broken through to popular culture. Hotly debated in a good or bad way, they both have proven now that there was a lot of intentionality behind them, and TBD in Jaguar’s case whether this will pay off in terms of sales. But both examples have transcended category norms, and embraced change to stand out and get noticed. Whether you personally like it or not, it is the most exciting branding has been in years, and I hope it’s here to stay!

Nonconformity in a category is hard. It could be seen as reckless to a consumer if some of the familiarity that they’re used to is lost, but when there is nothing to lose in Jaguar’s case, and a whole next generation to appeal to in both cases, why not embrace change? I applaud the marketing, designers, and artists for pushing a strong perspective on their brand ruthlessly. As I remember when marketing teams used to have these visions, and be empowered to make decisions, but now have resorted to testing work solely looking for the answer, relying on consumer appetite for something familiar, too scared to do something that might piss anyone off as they will certainly hear about it If they do! Cue blanding . . . snooze.

We know in a world where brands are competing for attention, consumers are bombarded with constant information, and not a lot is effective—our research shows 85% of marketing spending on brand assets that will likely go unnoticed. So, I ask, what is there to lose? Let’s advocate for difference. As we look ahead, expect a surge of unconventional rebrands, campaigns, and launches. Let’s go 2025.

– Lisa Smith, Global ECD at JKR

Time warping identities

The Time Warp trend incorporates visual elements from past, present, and future—a kind of historic mashup and a fresh take on retrofuturism. I’ve found that many creatives are excited about this trend because of the creative freedom they have producing this kind of imagery. The rise of interest in nostalgia in recent years has been massive, and while Time Warp has deep roots in the past, content creators and creative pros alike do not feel any type of constraint to accurately portray a specific historic moment here. Instead, they have limitless opportunities to play with visual elements from any moment in history, both real and imagined.

We’re already seeing many ads across sectors in tech, real estate, retail, food and beverage, and beyond, incorporating this trend as a nod to the past while presenting an innovative and compelling view into the future. I envision this trend next year representing the influence of the past, whether through common values, historic breakthroughs, or missteps now corrected, being used to build a better future—think sustainability, technology, physical and mental health, design, etc.

– Brenda Milis,  Principal of Consumer and Creative Insights, Adobe

Saying less, doing more

Brands will embrace the idea of saying less to do more, which should inspire a collective sigh of relief from social media managers around the world.

Brands today feel tremendous pressure to keep up with the ever-changing cultural landscape, and end up scrambling to jump on the latest trend, meme, and viral moments, saturating their communications with slang, emojis, and forced attempts to sound relatable. But this constant barrage of noise is backfiring—consumers are not just savvier than ever, they’re increasingly fatigued by the relentless push for attention. The brands that succeed next year will resist the urge to ride every bandwagon. They’ll move away from the chaos of trend-chasing, and instead focus on creating thoughtful, intentional interactions that make sense for them and them alone. By leaning into restraint, building intrigue through scarcity, and letting expertise speak for itself, brands will cut through the clutter. It’s not about staying silent, but about valuing authenticity and depth over fleeting relevance, delivering connections that truly and specifically resonate with today’s discerning audiences.

– Emily Heyward, Red Antler cofounder and Chief Brand Officer

Beyond quiet luxury

The “quiet luxury” trend of 2023-24 wasn’t really about the wealthy—it was about strivers desperately trying to emulate wealth through aesthetic minimalism. What The Row understood—and others misinterpreted—wasn’t about being quiet at all. It was about having nothing to prove.

In 2025, we’ll see a pendulum swing: luxury becoming intentionally louder, but in more sophisticated ways. Not through logos or traditional flex culture, but through signals that demonstrate deeper forms of capital: access, knowledge, time, relationships. The wealthy are realizing that trying to hide only creates more attention. Think: 1) Visible displays of “time wealth” (handmade, custom, wait-listed items; 2) Overt displays of cultural capital rather than just financial capital; and 3) Products that show off insider knowledge rather than just purchasing power

– Nikita Walia, Strategy Director at U.N.N.A.M.E.D.

Humility over hubris

Design has long been seen as a bridge between creativity and commerce, but somewhere along the way, it acquired a second job: altruism. As industries increasingly frame their work as purpose-driven, design has been cast as both the messenger and the message—a role that comes with immense, often untenable expectations. But why has graphic design been burdened with this mandate to be “good“? What does it mean for a visual language to bear the weight of social change? These questions present a contradiction: on one hand, the design industry celebrates its cultural relevance and ability to shape perceptions. On the other, it struggles under a collective anxiety: if design isn’t driving change, does it even matter?

This isn’t a dismissal of design’s impact—it’s a recalibration of its scope. Its true power lies not in changing the world, but changing how we see it. The danger, then, is over-romanticization—when every rebrand must carry a cause, design risks producing empty symbols, hollowing signifiers and watering down real issues. The trend to watch: perhaps quiet humility can replace performance. Instead of saving the world, design can just focus on sparking meaningful moments. But more likely, we’ll see the rise in what I’d call “performative impact branding”—gesturing towards change, without delivering it.

– Elliot Vredenburg, Creative Director at U.N.N.A.M.E.D. 

Brands that act as us, for us

Next year, we won’t be buying Christmas gifts online; our digital doubles will. These doubles will be our digital identities, representing our interests and brokering our relationship with brands.

Two significant AI developments have put this far-fetched idea within grasp. First, GenAI finally allows us to have an intelligible conversation with machines. ChatGPT and its ilk have revolutionized the way we ask for and get information. And second, the rise of agentic AI that actively does stuff opens up the possibility of delegating action. For example, in Google’s Project Mariner demo, you can supply the virtual agent with a recipe, and it goes online grocery shopping for you. Presto, we have the beginnings of a digital double.

We’ve already bared our souls to the likes of Meta, Google, and Amazon, and they would love to act on our behalf to book flights, buy jeans, and schedule our haircuts. But it’s tough to shrug off the lingering unease of knowing that our digital double is birthed by a company whose existence depends on monetizing us.

These brands follow a simple principle of entanglement—to get embedded in people’s lives as much as possible. That’s exactly what puts them in a position to make a claim to be a consumer’s ally, advocate, and agent. This does dial up the requisite trust factor. But despite protestations to the contrary, consumers have seldom shied away from providing these and other tech brands an embarrassment of personal information as long as they can expect something in return.So this is the next stage of the evolution of entanglement, and the brands will become even more intimate with their users.

– Dipanjan Chatterjee, Forrester VP and Principal Analyst

The rise of the quantum brand

As culture splinters across personalized digital spaces, “quantum branding” might be the next evolution in how organizations express their identity.

Unlike traditional brand segmentation or personalization, quantum brands could maintain multiple concurrent identities that manifest differently depending on who’s interacting with them and in what context. Like Schrödinger’s theoretical cat, these brands might be both one thing and many things at once, their state determined by who’s observing them and when.

Three AI technologies could accelerate this transformation. Generative AI already allows brands to create endless variations of content. General AI could help brands understand and navigate complex cultural contexts with human-like comprehension in real time. Perhaps most intriguingly, agentic AI (mentioned above) might enable brands to become truly responsive entities.

Tomorrow’s brand managers might evolve into brand programmers, working in virtual “brand labs” with tools that look more like cultural physics engines than marketing dashboards as they simulate and test different quantum states before deploying them into the wild. They may watch thousands of variant brand expressions compete and adapt in accelerated cultural environments, observing decades of brand evolution in days.

– Leland Maschmeyer, co-founder at Collins