3X WAYS BRANDS ARE REDISCOVERING THEIR WEIRD SIDE 

As consumers seek moments of delight in an increasingly complex world, culture is beginning to embrace the wonderfully weird. Across the internet, whimsy is evolving from an aesthetic to a behaviour, with TikTokers romanticising the everyday by adding edible stars to their morning coffees, sprinkle-topping their pints of Guinness and obsessing over viral dot cakes. And brands are following suit, moving away from clean minimalism and rediscovering the joy of the irrational. 

Here’s three ways brands are inviting a little absurdity into their playbooks: 

BRINGING PLAY BACK

For years brand spaces have been designed to be admired. Spaces of passive immersion, intended to be walked through rather than interacted with. Sensorial and cinematic. Today, brands are building experiences designed to played in, where giant ball pits, dinosaur slides and whimsical carousels invite consumers to become active participants rather than spectators. This isn’t a move away from experience, but towards interaction – brand worlds that consumers can slide through, jump into and photograph themselves at the centre of. 

McDonald’s made it’s Milan Design Week debut with a giant Damien Hirst-inspired ball pit set inside an empty swimming pool, designed to unlock childhood nostalgia through play. At the same event, Arket enlisted artist Laila Gohar to create a fully functioning carousel, replacing traditional horses with supersized fruit and vegetable seats. Over in London, Coach blurred the line between retail activation and amusement ride with its Selfridges Corner Shop takeover. The pop-up space was transformed into a playful charm playground complete with a towering dinosaur that visitors could slide down. 

RE-ENCHANTING EVERYDAY OBJECTS

As consumers use sprinkles to romanticise their everyday lives, brands are following suit by proving that even the most ordinary objects can become sources of delight. Familiar items are being injected with imagination, turning everyday essentials into conversation starters. In categories where functionality is increasingly expected, the brands that stand out aren't necessarily those with the best-performing products, but those with the best stories to tell. Cash App swapped the credit card for a whimsical limited-edition payment wand, while Crayola supersized the humble water bottle into an oversized crayon. Emma Chamberlain linked up with West Elm to reimagine the everyday water jug as a goose-shaped centrepiece, while Illy transformed espresso cups into monumental public art, sending giant versions floating through the canals of Venice during the Biennale. By leaning into the absurd, these brands are finding magic in the mundane - proving that the most memorable design isn't always the most functional, but often the most imaginative. 

BUILDING FANTASTICAL WORLDS

Across fashion and retail, fantastical creatures, fictional characters and surreal environments are cementing brands as purveyors of whimsy. Since Jonathan Anderson took the creative helm at Dior, the house has leaned heavily into this approach - bringing The Very Hungry Caterpillar into luxury fashion before continuing the narrative with surreal creations like hedgehog-shaped handbags. 

Few brands champion the absurd quite like Gentle Monster, whose ‘Veggie Farm' pop-ups blur the line between retail and fantasy, filling stores with giant vegetables brought to life with personalities. Moncler has taken a similar approach, letting colossal octopuses crawl across flagship stores around the world, turning the buildings themselves into part of an imagined universe. 

Brands aren’t stopping at reimagining individual products or building playful experiences, they’re constructing brand worlds where the ordinary rules of reality don’t apply. 

Words by Ella Palmer, Culture & Strategy.

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