Thirty-four designers, writers, strategists, motion designers and engineers in Clerkenwell and Lisbon. Independent since 2013, owned by the people who run it, and never more than ten projects at once.
Anjali Rao started Orvel in 2013 with two clients and a borrowed room on Great Sutton Street.1 The idea was simple: the identity, the website and the product should be made by the same people, in the same room.
In 2019 Tomás Ferreira opened Lisbon,2 after two seasons of working on Noturna from a café on Rua da Boavista. Same hours, same tools, one team.
Most brands now live on a screen, in motion, before they ever reach print. So we design the moving version first:3 the mark that turns, the page that loads, the screen that confirms a payment. If it holds up there, it holds up everywhere.
We stay small on purpose.4 Never more than ten projects at once, each one run by a partner from the first call to launch.
Thirty-four of us in all: eleven designers, seven engineers, five motion designers, four writers, four producers and three strategists. Every project is led by one of these four, from the first call to launch.
Founder, Creative DirectorLondon
Founded the studio and still sets the bar on every project. Runs the Thursday reviews in London and signs off every identity before it leaves the building.
Design DirectorLisbon
Opened Lisbon in 2019 and leads design across both studios. Builds the systems: the type, the grids, the rules that let a brand run without us.
Motion LeadLondon
Leads the five-person motion team. Decides how every brand behaves on screen, then directs the films that prove it.
Strategy DirectorLondon
Leads strategy and naming. Spends the first two weeks of every project with customers, then writes the one sentence everything else is checked against.
Lisbon and London keep the same time all year, so nothing is handed over between them. One stand-up, one Thursday review, and every team staffed from both rooms.
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Two floors above a print shop. A six-metre pin-up wall, an edit suite and the long table where Thursday reviews happen.
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Third floor in Santos, a street up from the river. Tiled stairwell, a sound booth and the morning light everyone argues over.
The person who pitches your project runs it, from the first call to launch. Not a hand-over to whoever happens to be free.
Every client sees work every Thursday, finished or not. Nothing waits for a big reveal, so nothing surprises you at the end.
A new mark is tested on a phone, in motion, before it ever appears in a PDF. If it cannot turn, split and settle, it is not finished.
One shared log, one line per decision. Nobody re-opens week three in week nine, including us.
We plan for normal hours. Weekend work is a planning failure, and we treat it like one, starting with the timeline.
Two open roles. We hire slowly and keep people: designers here stay six years on average.
You will join Kayode’s motion team of five, working across both studios on identities that have to move: marks that turn, launch films, and the small animations that make a product feel finished.
Email a link to your work and a few lines about two projects you would want to talk us through. No cover letter. Send it to jobs@orvel.studio with “Senior motion designer, Lisbon” in the subject line.
We reply to everyone within ten working days.
You will build the sites we design, alongside six other engineers and next to the designers who drew them. We build everything in-house, so what ships is what was designed.
Email a link to your work and a few lines about two projects you would want to talk us through. No cover letter. Send it to jobs@orvel.studio with “Senior front-end developer, London” in the subject line.
We reply to everyone within ten working days.
Not your role? We keep a folder of portfolios we love and read it first whenever something opens.
Visits are on Thursday afternoons, after the review, in either room. Bring the brief or just the question; we will put the kettle on.
Book a visitLondon--:--
Unit 4, 31 Great Sutton Street, Clerkenwell, London EC1V 0DX
Open now
Lisbon--:--
Rua da Boavista 72, 3.º, 1200-066 Lisboa
Open now
