Design Brands
That Last
A live brand strategy programme for everyone who shapes brands and wants a methodology rigorous enough to drive decisions and defend them.
October 5th-29th, 2026
4 Live Sessions and dedicated Q&A.
Limited seats available.
You are a better strategist than anyone in that meeting knows.
You just lack the methodology to prove it.
Invisible Work
You were hired for a specific scope. But the brand wasn't there, so you built it too.
The client paid for the deliverable. The strategy that made it hold, that was free.
The Missed Opportunity
You can see exactly what the brand needs next. A clearer positioning, a stronger narrative, a bigger conversation. But you don’t know how to put it on a proposal, so you don’t.
The Gut Feeling Defence
You know your decisions are right. You’re less sure how to explain why in a way that moves a client, convinces a stakeholder, or justifies your fee. So you say “it feels right” and hope they trust you.
The gap is always the same: strong instincts without the rigour to back them up.
Design Brands that Last closes it.
You leave as the most important person in the room: the one who builds it to last.
By the end of the programme, you will not see brands the same way again.
From week 1
You stop defending your decisions with taste and start anchoring them to strategy.
You build from a solid brand promise (audience, purpose, resolution) through visual storytelling and brand experience, all the way to a system that holds under pressure. Every step connects and every decision has a reason. You walk into a client meeting knowing not just what you designed, but why it works for this brand, their audience, and that moment.
From week 2
You start seeing brands differently.
You learn to use storytelling as a strategic lens to read the brand experience as a narrative: where it breaks, what that costs the brand, and where the opportunities for growth are hiding.
That expertise becomes part of how you work as a core service you define, propose, and charge for.
From week 3
You know how to assess what a brand is doing across every touchpoint.
You start recognising the patterns that make a brand hold, the gaps that will cause problems, and the moves that create growth. You spot these things in your clients’ brands, in competitors, in brands you have admired for years without knowing why.
And once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Every project after this one becomes an opportunity to apply it.
From week 4
You build a strong ecosystem to create brands that stand the test of time and change.
In the moments when a client wants to pivot, a stakeholder wants to override, or a decision needs to be made fast, you’re the person who keeps everyone anchored to what the brand actually stands for.
You make faster calls when the brand needs to shift. You won’t resist change, but you know what can change and what must stay fixed.
That’s not a workshop outcome.
That’s a different way of working that takes years of experience to develop, and that
I can teach you in 4 live sessions.
From the first cohort in Spring 2026
-
![Kristina Podnar]()
"As someone who helps organisations align decisions, accountability, and execution, I appreciate that Chiara treats branding as an organisational capability that must be managed over time. Her workshop combines storytelling, design, and AI in a way that strengthens strategic thinking while providing a practical, step-by-step approach to building and sustaining a brand throughout its lifecycle. I left the workshop with greater clarity around my own personal brand and a deeper appreciation for how organisations should approach branding as a strategic asset rather than simply a marketing exercise."
Kristina Podnar
Digital Policy Strategist and Author of The Power of Digital Policy -
![Angela Violino]()
"I have worked in branding for many years. This workshop still gave me something new. Chiara's approach does not complicate the process. It makes the thinking clearer and easier to share with clients. After these four weeks, I started seeing brand as a living system, where identity, audience, value and transformation are all connected. What stayed with me most was finally having the structure to explain steps I had always applied by instinct. The conversation with clients changes. You stop talking about logos and colours and start talking about direction, positioning, and what the brand is actually building over time. Chiara teaches through a constant flow of real examples. Every concept lands immediately. What I keep coming back to: you learn to explain the value of your work to a client. And perhaps, along the way, to see it yourself."
Angela Violino
Brand Communication Designer and Visual Storyteller -
![Christina Stamatoukos]()
"As a founder without formal training in branding, I often work from instinct first. I can feel when something I am building has life, integrity, or momentum, but I do not always have the language for it. Design Brands that Last gave me a framework to turn that intuition into something more precise, strategic, and cultural. The onliness statement exercise, based on Marty Neumeier's concept, was the one that landed most powerfully for me. It helped me name parts of my brand that were already alive but not yet fully defined. At this stage in my work, it gave me a real sense of confidence: the world we are building is not only ambitious, but deep enough to deserve structure. What I appreciated most is that the workshop made branding feel less like an aesthetic exercise. It became about the architecture of meaning: promise, experience, trust, and the choices that allow a brand to grow without losing itself. I would recommend this to any founder building something with more depth than their current materials can fully express. It helps you keep the magic and build a real system behind it. Bringing a new world into form asks for more than colours and words."
Christina Stamatoukos
CEO and Founder at Carob -
![Dimitra Tsoli]()
"An inspiring, highly interactive and hands-on four-week deep dive into brand storytelling, audience experience, and the methodology behind brands that truly connect with people. During the sessions, we were challenged to think beyond logos and visuals. Chiara brings together strategy, creativity, and structure in an exceptional way, supported by impeccable materials and beautifully crafted visualisations. Without a doubt, one of the most inspiring learning experiences I’ve had recently. Understanding how these experiences are intentionally designed opened an entirely new perspective for me that I am now applying directly to my work."
Dimitra Tsoli
Senior Compliance Professional at DESFA | M.Sc. Digital Culture -
![Lena Lekkou]()
"Even when you are already familiar with a methodology, it is always incredibly refreshing and inspiring to see it through the lens of another designer. It shifts your perspective and sparks new ideas."
Lena Lekkou
Head of Design Department at SAE Creative Media
Design Brands that Last is built around one idea: you learn best when you can see the thinking in action, not just hear about it.
Every week, we work together on a real brand, so the methodology isn’t abstract. You watch how brand promise connects to visual storytelling, how visual storytelling shapes brand experience, how experience feeds strategy.
Each week builds on the last. By week four, you’re not looking at four separate topics. You’re looking at one complete ecosystem.
The programme runs across four weeks. Four live sessions of two hours each, and four dedicated Q&A sessions.*
The gap between the live session and the Q&A gives you time to sit with the concepts before you ask questions. Those Thursday sessions consistently go deepest: into how to apply this with real clients, how to charge for it, and how to handle the moments when a stakeholder pushes back.
*Each session comes with practical tasks. Exercises that take the concepts into your own work. They’re not mandatory, but the participants who do them leave with something they can use immediately.
All sessions are live and recorded. Recordings are sent to all participants the day after. Q&A sessions are live and not recorded, to protect the privacy of the group.
WEEK 1The Brand
Define the brand promise and narrative. Audience, purpose, resolution: the foundation everything else is built on.
Live session (2 hours):
Monday, October 5th, 5-7 pm (Athens time)
Q&A session (1 hour):
Thursday, October 8th, 5-6 pm (Athens time)
WEEK 2Brand Storytelling
Translate the brand story into visual language. Colour, typography, imagery: not as aesthetic choices, but as strategic ones.
Live session (2 hours):
Monday, October 12th, 5-7 pm (Athens time)
Q&A session (1 hour):
Thursday, October 15th, 5-6 pm (Athens time)
WEEK 3Brand Experience
Design consistent touchpoints and learn to assess them. Where the brand holds, where it breaks, and what to do about it.
Live session (2 hours):
Monday 19 October, 5-7 pm (Athens time)
Q&A session (1 hour):
Thursday, May 22nd, 5-6 pm (Athens time)
WEEK 4Brand Strategy
Understand how brands evolve without losing what they stand for. What growth looks like when it is strategic, and what it costs when it is not.
Live session (2 hours):
Monday October 26th, 5-7 pm (Athens time)
Q&A session (1 hour):
Thursday, October 29th, 5-6 pm (Athens time)
By the end of the programme, you will have a complete process, a new way of seeing brands, and a thinking partner that stays with you after the last session ends.
4 Live Sessions and dedicated Q&A.
Limited seats available.
Design Brands that Last is for practitioners who already work on brands at a strategic level: designers, brand managers, agency owners, marketing directors, founders.
They know there is a layer of thinking behind their best decisions that they have not yet been able to name, systematise, or charge for.
This programme doesn’t give you ready-made solutions. It teaches you a way of thinking that goes deep and stays with you, so every decision you make carries more confidence than the one before.
-
Work on branding projects as part of a broader practice and want a complete strategic framework to anchor your decisions
Can already produce strong work but want to understand the thinking that makes it hold over time
Want to move from instinctive brand decisions to ones grounded in a methodology you can explain and defend
Are ready to position brand strategy as a core part of what you offer, and charge for it properly
Want to understand how AI fits into brand thinking, without letting it replace the thinking
This programme also works if you’re building your own brand. The methodology applies whether the client is you or someone else.
-
Expect frameworks to work without adaptability or flexibility
Want simple reassurance that your current methods are the best
Need a shortcut to setting up a brand quickly. Every brand has its own pace and rhythm. Speed is not part of this methodology
Use a rebrand to signal change rather than create it
Expect AI to think for you instead of work with you
Meet your tutor
Chiara Aliotta is a brand strategist and the founder of Until Sunday Studio, based in Syros, Greece.
For more than 15 years she has worked with startups, tech companies, and not-for-profit organisations globally, helping them build brands that hold under pressure and evolve without losing what makes them distinct.
Chiara is a strategist who can also execute, which means she does not just advise on what a brand should be. She builds it, down to the last detail.
Her practice is built on recognising patterns, asking better questions, and designing systems that last.
Design Brands that Last is a direct reflection of that practice: real clients, real constraints, real decisions. She teaches what she does, not what she has read.
Design Brands that Last is four weeks of live thinking, real decisions, and direct access to a methodology that took 15 years to build. You leave with a process, a perspective, and an AI strategic companion that stays with you on every project after.
The Programme Experience
Full access to the live
sessions /Q&A experience
€ 590
It includes:
Four informative live sessions with practical advice, fully interactive and recorded
One-hour review session to discuss ideas and review exercises/concepts (not recorded)
Exclusive Slack channel available to students
Quality, attention and care (there are only 50 places available*)
Toolkits and AI tools, created to be used inside the course and on real projects
Access to session slides and other workshop materials
A certificate of completion
Design Brands that Last is a live brand strategy programme created for designers, brand managers, marketing directors, and founders who want to move beyond logos and trends, and learn how to build brands that hold, stay consistent, and grow over time.
Led by Chiara Aliotta, founder of Until Sunday Studio, the programme combines brand strategy, storytelling, UX design, and real-world practice to help participants design brands as systems: shaped by narrative, experience, and long-term thinking, not shortcuts.
Every participant also receives Chiara in the Room: four AI thinking tools, one for each week of the methodology, built to help you sense-check decisions and apply what you learned long after the programme ends.
The Programme Experience
+ 1:1 Session
Includes the full live sessions/Q&A plus a 1:1 strategic review
€ 890
It includes:
Four informative live sessions with practical advice, fully interactive and recorded
One-hour review session to discuss ideas and review exercises/concepts (not recorded)
Exclusive Slack channel available to students
Quality, attention and care (there are only 50 places available*)
Toolkits and AI tools, created to be used inside the course and on real projects
Access to session slides and other workshop materials
A certificate of completion
1:1 consulting (1 hour)
Design Brands that Last is a live brand strategy programme created for designers, brand managers, marketing directors, and founders who want to move beyond logos and trends, and learn how to build brands that hold, stay consistent, and grow over time.
Led by Chiara Aliotta, founder of Until Sunday Studio, the programme combines brand strategy, storytelling, UX design, and real-world practice to help participants design brands as systems: shaped by narrative, experience, and long-term thinking, not shortcuts.
Every participant also receives Chiara in the Room: four AI thinking tools, one for each week of the methodology, built to help you sense-check decisions and apply what you learned long after the programme ends.
This option includes full access to the Design Brands that Last live programme, plus a dedicated 1:1 strategic review session with Chiara Aliotta.
The 1:1 session is for participants actively working on a brand, product, or personal project who want focused, personalised feedback. Together, you will review your brand strategy, narrative, and experience, identify gaps or inconsistencies, and clarify the next steps that make sense for your specific context.
This option is ideal if you want to go beyond group discussions and apply the programme content directly to your project, with guidance shaped around your goals, constraints, and stage of growth.
Special discount for students
and Smashing Magazine Members
-
If so, you will receive a special discount for this workshop. Just send me a snapshot of your course certificate, and I will send you a personalised code.
-
Send me your university card (or other proof that you are a student) and I will send you a special discount code.
-
I am too! As such I appreciate this beautiful community, so you will receive a special workshop discount too. Simply check your membership page to retrieve the code.
FAQs
-
No. The programme is for anyone who makes brand decisions: designers, brand managers, marketing directors, founders.
If you work with brands at a strategic level and want a rigorous framework to anchor your decisions, you are in the right place.
-
Yes. Several participants in the first cohort had years of professional experience.
The value is not in learning new vocabulary. It is in having the methodology to articulate and systematise what you already apply by instinct.
-
All sessions are live online.
Four sessions of two hours each, every Monday. Each is followed by a dedicated Q&A on Thursday of the same week.
A Slack channel is open for the duration of the programme for discussion, questions, and peer exchange.
-
The live sessions are recorded and sent to all participants the day after.
The Q&A sessions are not recorded, to protect the privacy of the group. Attending live is where the deepest learning happens.
-
Within the Q&A sessions, you can bring your own work and ask directly.
You can also share in Slack for the group to engage with.
If you want a dedicated private session with Chiara, choose The Programme Experience + 1:1 Session (€890): one hour of individual brand strategy consultancy.
-
The Programme Experience (€590): four live sessions, four Q&A sessions, Chiara in the Room AI tools, practical exercises, session slides and materials, Slack channel access, and a certificate of completion.
The Programme Experience + 1:1 Session (€890): everything above, plus one private 60-minute brand strategy session with Chiara.
No hidden fees. A clear invoice is issued to each participant.
-
Full refunds are available up to two weeks before the programme begins.
As with any online platform, payment and platform commissions will be deducted from the refunded amount.
After that date, refunds are not available. If the programme is cancelled, you will be informed and reimbursed under the same conditions.
If you have more questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me.
