Showing the making: how atelier brands explain their price online

A price needs a story behind it

A silk scarf, a made-to-measure jacket or a hand-finished leather piece can cost many times more than something that looks similar at first glance. In person, the difference is felt in the hand. On a screen it has to be shown and explained, in a way that is specific rather than boastful.

Five ways to show the making

1. Name the materials precisely. Not “fine silk”, but the weave, the weight and where it was woven. Specific facts persuade more than adjectives, and they are what curious clients search for.
2. Photograph the process, not only the product. Patterns on the table, pins, chalk marks, hands at work, the bench. A short series of process images on each product page does more than another angle of the finished piece.
3. Show the details up close. Hems, stitches, edges, linings, the inside of the piece. Close photographs answer the questions a client would otherwise ask in the shop.
4. Introduce the people. The cutter, the seamstress, the workshop. With their consent and in their own words: what they do, and for how long they have done it.
5. Explain the time. How many hours, how many fittings, how long a made-to-order piece takes. Time is the most honest explanation of a price.

Make care and repair part of the brand

Care instructions, alterations and repairs are often hidden in a footnote. For an atelier, they are proof that the piece is made to last. Give them a page of their own, and say what the atelier will do for a piece in five or ten years.

Keep the rhythm slow

Atelier brands do not need daily content. A collection told well, a few process stories each season and a well-kept archive work better than a constant feed. The website should feel like the workshop: calm, precise and unhurried.

The studio art-directs product and process photography for premium and atelier brands. See premium brands & lifestyle.