Identifying a flat experience with lack of brand storytelling

Highland Park set out on a rebranding project to evolve its brand and reach a wider audience. While it had previously focused on a small group of whisky experts, the goal was to expand its appeal to affluent millennials. As part of this shift, the brand wanted to move away from its dark and heavy “whisky prison” aesthetic and adopt a lighter, more luxurious feel. The project involved collaboration between a branding agency, our agency, and a development agency.

With a new brand identity and target audience in mind, it was crucial for the website to reflect these changes. To understand this new audience better, we ran workshops with the client, where we identified a few key insights. These consumers want to enjoy themselves in a way that aligns with their values. They gravitate towards brands and experiences that express luxury in a subtle, personal way rather than something flashy or over-the-top. For them, it’s not just about the product—it’s about whether the brand’s identity resonates with them.

Looking at the existing website through this lens, the biggest issue in existing website was the lack of brand storytelling.

Given Highland Park’s rich heritage and craftsmanship, storytelling should have been central to the digital experience, but the website felt more like a generic product catalogue. The About page buried the brand’s history in dense, all-uppercase text with no visuals, making it unengaging and hard to read. The same issue extended to the product detail pages, where tasting notes and key selling points like awards were hidden within long text blocks, making the experience feel flat and uninspiring. Without strong storytelling, the site failed to bring the brand to life or create an emotional connection with users.

After identifying these key areas, the UX team worked on IA and wireframes while the design team developed experience principles. Defining these principles was crucial, as the new brand identity was still in progress, meaning there were no established frameworks like brand look & feel or tone of voice to reference. This helped align the branding agency, our agency, and the client under a shared vision, providing much-needed guidance throughout the process.

Immersive storytelling through interactive design

To create a lasting memory, we designed a scroll-triggered interactive experience enriched by AI-generated visuals. These experiences highlighted Highland Park’s history, the uniqueness of Orkney Island, and the craftsmanship behind each bottle, immersing users in the brand’s narrative.While the interactive element faced constraints due to policy issues, the concept inspired alternative approaches that incorporated high-impact visuals.

Modern Visual Identity

Inspired by luxury brands like Gucci and Cartier, we used a brighter, refined aesthetic with subtle animations and premium design elements. The colour palette shifted to lighter tones, aligning with the brand’s repositioning, while maintaining authenticity through textures and details reminiscent of Orkney.

This project highlighted the importance of aligning digital experiences with an evolving brand identity and target audience. It also reinforced how storytelling plays a crucial role in conveying a sense of luxury—not just through visual design, but through the way information is structured and presented to create a deeper brand connection.

One of the biggest challenges was balancing creative exploration with brand constraints. While the AI-based storytelling concept didn’t make it into the final product, it pushed us to think in new ways, proving the value of experimenting within limitations.

Working on AI-driven design was a particularly valuable learning experience for me. From developing the narrative using ChatGPT, generating visuals through Midjourney, and refining them into motion-based storytelling, the process was complex and completely new to me. Although it was challenging, it gave me hands-on experience in integrating AI into the design workflow, which I found incredibly rewarding.

Another key aspect of this project was collaboration across multiple teams. Since we worked alongside the branding agency, tech agency, and client, clear communication was essential. Unlike projects where our agency also handles development, this required a full handoff once the designs were signed off. We put extra effort into documentation and file organisation, ensuring there were no ambiguities or room for misinterpretation. As a result, the tech agency specifically praised the clarity of our files, mentioning that they were the most well-structured files they had received.

Adding to the complexity, the rebranding process was happening simultaneously, which meant that a lot of things were still in flux. We often had to adapt and make changes along the way, but this also made it an exciting opportunity to collaborate across multiple teams. Despite the challenges, the project was a great learning experience, especially in managing a large-scale, multi-team collaboration while keeping the design process structured and efficient.