The system · 01 hydro serum → 02 barrier cream → 03 night balm
A concept end-to-end project for a minimalist three-step skincare line: hydro serum pulls water, barrier cream repairs, night balm seals. Numbered 01·02·03, mass-tinted palette, dry-embossed monogram. Three products that read as a scale, not as three different brands.
The system · 01 hydro serum → 02 barrier cream → 03 night balm
That's where the name comes from. huma — three letters of a recognizable root, one final vowel, four characters in all. It's always written in lowercase, it reads the same in Italian, English, Korean and Spanish, and it fits the front of a 30 ml bottle without crowding.
No claim, no adjective, no verb. The front of the packs carries only four pieces of information, always in the same order:
number · name · actives · volume
e.g. 01 hydro serum — frosted glass, 30 ml
The numbering isn't decorative: it's the sequence in which hydration actually works. First you pull the water in, then you repair the barrier that holds it, then you seal it.
Pulls water into the surface layers. Multiple molecular weights so it works both deep and shallow. Frosted glass bottle mass-tinted Blue, 30 ml, pipette.
Rebuilds the lipid cement. The lead product of the line, the one all communication is tuned around. Jar mass-tinted Sage, 50 ml, Cap White lid.
Dense night-time texture: slows transepidermal water loss while the skin regenerates. Jar mass-tinted Sand, 50 ml, Cap White lid.
One per function. No overlap, no doubles.
Formulated for reactive skin.
Plant-derived synthetic ceramides, olive-derived squalane.
Glass and paperboard mass-tinted in the same family.
Period-after-opening consistent across all three.
The front of the bottle carries the number big, the name small, the actives line in mono, the volume at the bottom. Everything that needs to be read twice lives on the back: INCI, dosage, PAO, batch code, regulatory disclaimer.
The frosted glass is mass-tinted in the same shade as the outer paperboard: glass and carton read as a single object, not container plus wrapper.
Dry embossing on the carton. It costs little — one plate, no added color — it doesn't use up the fifth colour on press, and it gives mass-tinted paperboard the one thing a flat colour can't have on its own: relief.
You only see it in raking light. That's what makes it a detail for the hand, not the shelf.
"skin minimal, results maximal" never appears on the retail packs: those have to work on the shelf, and on the shelf one more sentence is noise. The payoff speaks to someone who has already bought, at the moment they open the parcel — which is the only moment you have real attention.
Three mass-tinted pastels, a white for stoppers and pipettes, a black for type. No accent outside these five: color identifies the reference, it doesn't decorate the pack.
Glass + carton
same shade
per reference
Outfit Light. Geometric, clean terminals, very open bowls: it holds up at massive size and at 8 pt on frosted glass. Tracking −0.045 em, always lowercase, never italic.
Neutral grotesque. Carries the product name and the actives line: only two weights, regular and medium, centered under the number.
Monospaced for batches, codes and INCI lists: it aligns the back-panel columns and stays above the 6 pt minimum required by EC Reg. 1223/2009.
Tall and narrow for the 30 ml bottle, short and wide for the 50 ml jars: same grid, same embossing, same reading order.
Same soft side light as the product shots, same ivory background, no retouching on skin texture: the range is shown applied, in order.
The texture library is modular: one tile per formula, reusable across e-commerce, social, back panels. Change the crop, not the image.
One tile per formula · reusable across e-commerce and social
Five pictograms on the same 38 px grid, 1.5 pt stroke, printed in black on the right side of the carton. Vegan · certified organic · never tested on animals · fragrance free · dermatologically tested. No third-party badges to muddy the hierarchy.
The first direction was Linfa — botany and craft. Prickly pear illustration, deep green + fuchsia palette (#14271F, #E7EBE1, #B0355F), semi-italic type. A world that spoke about provenance, herbaria, ritual.
It didn't survive the first shelf test: at 200 pixels, in a grid of 40 skincare thumbnails, "Linfa" disappeared. The category is saturated with botanical illustration: the differentiator born at brief vanishes on the market.
The move to huma flipped the logic: less world around, more object. Color becomes reference, monogram becomes hand, background disappears.
Mass-tinted. Glass and paperboard in the same shade, cap always white: the range reads as a scale, not as three different products.
It's dry embossing: only visible in raking light, and that's what makes it a hand detail, not a shelf detail.
Number, name, actives, volume. The payoff lives on the shipping box, where it speaks to someone who has already bought.
The system is designed to grow: adding a fourth reference (04 SPF, 04 exfoliant) means picking a mass tint and aligning to the grid — nothing in the identity moves.
Naming ("huma"), payoff "skin minimal, results maximal", four-field rule on the front (number · name · actives · volume), category mini-glossary.
Wordmark, monogram for embossing, five-color palette (Blue, Sage, Sand, Cap White, Ink), typographic system Outfit + Instrument Sans + DM Mono.
Mass-tinted glass for the serum (30 ml), mass-tinted jars for cream and balm (50 ml), cartons in two formats (42×42×148 and 68×68×88), shared Cap White lid.
Single embossing plate for the monogram. Kraft shipping box with circular embossing, no external print. The payoff lives here.
Back panel with INCI, dosage, PAO, batch code, disclaimer — aligned to a DM Mono grid, minimum body 6 pt, technical margin 4 mm (EC Reg. 1223/2009).
Soft side-light recipe, ivory background, no skin retouching. 3×6 modular texture library, reusable on e-commerce, social, back panels.
huma is a fictional brand created as a self-initiated concept project to demonstrate identity and packaging capabilities. It is not a real product, it is not for sale, and the regulatory information shown is illustrative only.
huma was born from our Brand Reframing / Identity from scratch service. 4-phase method, 6–8 week timing, deliverables handed over to your cloud with 100% ownership.
Discover Brand ReframingFull identity for an emerging radio platform: animated logo, system, site with motion signature.
Digital ecosystem for a biotech distributor: B2B e-commerce, rep portal, orders dashboard.
Direct-booking engine + Meta Ads campaigns for a Brazilian hospitality property.
Brand identity + packaging for a cat calming supplement. Day & Night system, sun/moon mark.
Book a free audit. In 30 minutes we'll tell you what we'd build for you and how.