Creative Director
Lewis Wilks
Lewis is an award-winning designer and the Creative Director of Berlew, a Nottingham-based design agency specialising in branding and web design. A recipient of two D&AD New Blood Awards, including the prestigious White Pencil, he combines creativity with strategy to craft impactful brands and user-focused websites. Lewis leads Berlew, helping businesses build a brand presence that holds up through thoughtful design and user-focused websites.
- Branding
- Brand identity design
- Logo design
- Website design
- UI/UX design
Articles by Lewis Wilks
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How to Build an Accessible Brand Colour Palette
Most brands pick colours they like, hand them to a developer, and find out months later that the buttons are unreadable. Contrast is a property of a pairing, not of a colour, and once you design around that the whole problem gets easier to solve.
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How to Use a Design Brief Generator for Portfolio Case Studies
Strong portfolios need case studies, but early-career designers often lack client work to show. A design brief generator solves that by giving you structured fake client briefs you can treat like real commissions, then document as portfolio proof.
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Brand Identity vs Logo: What Your Business Actually Needs in 2026
If you are starting the year thinking you just need a new logo, pause for a moment. A logo is a useful shorthand, but it is only one piece of a much bigger system that helps people recognise you, trust you, and take action. In 2026, with attention spans short and channels fragmented, a cohesive brand identity is what turns first impressions into enquiries and sales.
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Who gets seen? What AI imagery reveals about representation in the UK
Generative AI is reshaping visual culture, but who does it show when you ask for a UK doctor, nurse or CEO? Berlew generated five lifelike images per profession across 11 roles and compared them with official workforce data. The pattern: outdated white, male defaults that underrepresent women and ethnic minorities in care roles and erase diversity in leadership.
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What Does A Bespoke Logo Really Mean For Your Brand?
If you have ever wondered what "bespoke" actually means when it comes to logos, you are not alone. It gets used a lot, yet many businesses still end up with something that looks like a slightly tweaked template. This 2026 guide gives a clear, honest take on bespoke logos, why they matter, and when the investment makes sense.
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The World’s Most Colourful Cities: How places use colour to build identity
From Burano's rainbow facades to Chefchaouen's blue-washed walls, some cities are famous for signature colours that define their identity. Berlew analysed 125 cities worldwide to rank the 20 most colourful, and explain how city colour palettes work as destination branding.
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Are Unlimited Graphic Design Services Worth It? (UK Guide)
Unlimited graphic design services give you consistent, on-brand visuals without the hassle of hiring in-house or chasing freelancers. For a flat monthly fee, you get fast turnarounds, unlimited revisions, and predictable costs, but they are not the right fit for every business. This UK guide explains what unlimited design services include, who they suit, and how they compare with freelancers, in-house hires, and marketplaces.
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Should You Rebrand Your Business or Simply Refresh?
Your brand is more than a logo or tagline, it is how people read your business at a glance. When growth, markets or expectations shift, the question is whether to rebrand your business or simply refresh what you already have. This guide sets out the difference in plain terms and helps you pick the right move.
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Calculate Your Website Redesign ROI: Numbers That Matter
TLDR: Our calculator shows you how a strategic website redesign can increase your conversion rate by up to 47%, how many additional clients you'll gain monthly, how much extra revenue that represents, and exactly how long it will take to recover your investment. Based on a study of 396 businesses that boosted their conversion rates from […]
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Web Design Tips: 10 Simple Tips That Improve Conversion
If you run a business, a website that converts visitors into enquiries matters, and design plays a bigger role than many owners expect. This updated July 2026 guide shares ten simple web design tips that improve conversion, from clean layouts and mobile-friendly pages to obvious CTAs, speed, navigation, branding, visual hierarchy, quality images, A/B testing and social proof.
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UX for SEO: How User Experience Helps Improve Search Rankings
UX and SEO are not the same discipline, but they overlap heavily. Updated July 2026, this guide explains how navigation, page speed, mobile usability and readable content support search visibility, and which UX fixes to prioritise first.
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Logo Design vs Brand Identity: Key Differences Explained (and Why It Matters)
A logo is the symbol people recognise first. Brand identity is the wider system, colour, typography, tone of voice, imagery and customer experience , that makes every touchpoint feel like the same business. This guide explains logo design vs brand identity honestly, with practical UK context for 2026.
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How to Develop a Brand Voice That Connects with Your Audience
If your website sounds corporate but your social posts read like a friend, your brand voice is probably undefined, not "wrong". This guide covers how to develop a brand voice that connects with your audience in 2026: align it with your mission, research how your customers actually speak, write guidelines people will use, and carry tone through web design and everyday copy.
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How to Build a Powerful E-commerce Brand (Development Guide)
Brand development for e-commerce businesses in the UK: how to define your brand, understand your customers and build an identity that earns loyalty and repeat sales. Practical steps from a Nottinghamshire studio.
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Discover the Best SEO Plug-ins for WordPress in 2026
SEO plug-ins are powerful tools that can transform your WordPress website's visibility and drive organic traffic. This guide compares the best WordPress SEO plug-ins for 2026. Rank Math, Yoast SEO, All in One SEO and SEOPress , and shows how to choose the right one for your site.
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The Ultimate Guide to Branding Trends of 2025
Branding trends 2025 cover experiential engagement, purpose-driven design, digital-first strategy, personalisation, and sustainability. The brands pulling ahead are not chasing every trend, they pick the ones that fit what they stand for and apply them consistently.
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Essential Graphic Design Trends for Brand Building in 2025
Graphic design keeps shifting, and brands that treat visual identity as static fall behind. Updated July 2026, this guide distils the graphic design trends that still matter for brand building, from immersive 3D and AR through bold type, eco-conscious choices, retro-modern styling and bespoke illustration.
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Top Web Design Trends for 2025
Web design keeps shifting, and sites that treat layout as a one-off project tend to feel dated long before the offer does. Updated July 2026, this guide distils the web design trends for 2025 that still earn their place, from immersive 3D and motion through clean, usable interfaces to mobile-first development.
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The Essentials of Wireframing for Beginners
Wireframing is a low-fidelity blueprint for a website's layout, navigation and content hierarchy, before colour, photography or final copy. Updated July 2026, this guide walks through the basics of wireframing for beginners: what to include, which tools to try, common mistakes and how wireframes feed into UX-led web design.
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The Ultimate Guide to Understanding UI and UX Design
UI covers the visual interface; UX shapes the full journey from first visit to completed task. Updated July 2026, this guide explains UI and UX design principles, tools, user testing and branding, with practical advice on what to prioritise when time and budget are limited.
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Why a Well-Designed Website is Crucial for Your Business Success
Your website is often the first place someone meets your business. Updated July 2026, this guide explains why a well-designed website matters for credibility, user experience, search visibility and brand consistency , and where to start when time and budget are limited.
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Why Mobile-First Design Is Essential For Your Website
Mobile-first design starts with the smallest screen and scales up, and in 2026 it is still the sensible default for most UK business websites. This guide covers what mobile-first means, why it matters for SEO and usability, practical implementation tips, and when professional help is worth it.
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The Role of Visual Storytelling in Graphic Design for Creative Businesses
Visual storytelling is how your brand communicates before anyone reads a word, through imagery, colour, type and layout that add up to a coherent narrative. This guide covers the role of visual storytelling in graphic design for creative businesses in 2026: what it actually means, how it connects to branding and web design, and how to measure whether your visuals are doing the job.
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Building Trust: How to Create a Design Portfolio That Converts
Your portfolio is often the first proof a client sees, before a call, before a brief, before trust is earned. This guide covers how to curate work, write case studies that show outcomes, design a cohesive layout, gather testimonials and keep everything fresh in 2026.
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UX and UI: What's The Difference And Why It Matters
UX is whether someone can complete a task easily; UI is the visual layer they tap and read. Updated July 2026, this guide explains the difference, why both matter for your brand, and where to start when time and budget are limited.
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Creative funding across the UK: Where needs to level up?
Where does England need to level up creative funding? Berlew scored the largest cities on Arts Council England spend per capita plus maximum council arts grants. Manchester tops the index; Preston, Rochdale and Wolverhampton sit at the bottom. Full top-10 and bottom-10 tables inside.
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How to Reduce Client Amends in the Creative Industry
Revisions are part of creative work. The problem is when feedback loops never close, scope creeps, the brief drifts, and everyone loses time. As a Nottingham design studio, we have seen what separates tidy projects from amend-heavy ones. Here is a practical 2026 refresh on reducing client amends without shutting down useful feedback.
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Why Every TikTok Influencer Should Have a Website (2026 Guide)
TikTok can build reach fast, but the platform controls your following, your discoverability and your income options. A website gives creators an owned home base, a TikTok portfolio for brands, content that ranks in Google, and room for merch, memberships and email. Here is an honest 2026 guide to what to build and why.
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The Ultimate Guide to Building a Strong Creative Brand
Building a strong creative brand is not optional in a crowded market, but "brand" is more than a logo. This 2026 guide walks through the core elements, seven practical steps, and how Nottingham-based Berlew Design Studio helps UK businesses turn strategy into a cohesive identity that works across web, social and print.
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What Is Website Design and Development?
Website design and development are two disciplines that combine to build functional, attractive sites. Updated July 2026, this guide explains what designers and developers do, how they differ, what to budget in the UK, and why you need both working together, not one without the other.
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Upcoming Design Industry Trends in 2025: What You Need to Know
The design industry keeps shifting, and trends only help when they solve real problems for your audience. Updated July 2026, this guide distils seven design industry trends, from sustainable practice and minimalism through immersive media, accessibility, data-informed work, authentic branding and agility, with practical advice on what to adopt.
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Top 10 Website Design Tips for a Stunning Website
Ten practical website design tips from a Nottingham studio: UX, simplicity, branding, CTAs, visuals, responsive layout, SEO, testing, and when to bring in professional help. Written for UK businesses that want a clearer site, not fluff.
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How UX Design Principles Can Enhance Your Website
UX design is about making your website useful, accessible and easy to navigate, not just good-looking. Updated July 2026, this guide walks through eight UX design principles that enhance your website, from user-centric layouts and clear navigation to mobile performance, visual hierarchy and consistent branding.
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What Makes a Brand? Creating a Successful Brand Identity
What makes a brand successful in a crowded market? This guide explains how successful brands are created step by step, from strategy and values through visual identity to consistent activation, and what makes a good brand identity worth investing in.
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10 Must-Have WordPress Plugins | The Best WordPress Plugins
Creating a standout WordPress website takes more than just great design, it is about the right tools too. Plugins can help you do lots of things on a WordPress site, many of them making it much easier to make changes that would otherwise require complex code. But there are so many to choose from, and some can do more harm than good, so which ones should you choose?
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Squarespace or WordPress: Which Platform is More Suitable for Your Website?
Squarespace and WordPress are two of the most popular website platforms on the market. As a website designer with 10+ years' experience, I have used both on client projects. Neither is definitively better, the right choice depends on your priorities, budget and how much control you want. This 2026 guide compares cost, design flexibility, SEO and maintenance so you can decide honestly.
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What Is The Importance Of Branding? A Practical Guide For UK Businesses
Branding is far more than a logo. It is how people recognise you, decide whether to trust you, and choose you again. This guide covers the importance of branding for UK businesses in 2026, what it actually delivers, where it shows up, and how to build it without guesswork.
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How To Do a Website Audit
A website audit checks whether your site is accessible, easy to use, on-brand and fast enough to keep visitors engaged. This 2026 guide walks through the full process, from contrast and keyboard navigation to load times and broken links, plus how to prioritise fixes and know when to call in help.
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Harmonising Branding and Web Design: A 2026 Guide for UK Businesses
If your website looks polished but feels like a different business from your socials, brochures or shopfront, the gap is usually branding in web design , not a missing plug-in. This guide explains how brand identity and web design should work as one system in 2026, when custom work beats templates, and what to track so your site stays on-brand as you grow.
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Why Should You Rebrand? 6 Signs It Is Time For a Change
Rebranding aligns your visual identity and strategy with where the business is heading, not where it was three years ago. If your marketing mix, audience or market position has shifted, these six signs help you decide whether it is time for a full rebrand or a lighter refresh in 2026.
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Berl-Who? Berlew's Mission Told Through Branding
Berlew is a Nottingham creative agency whose mission is to use design to generate customers for its customers. Here is how our colour palette, growth pattern and logo mark tell that story, and what it means if you are building a brand of your own.