When the product writes the brand: Ozon Studio and torso electronics — The Brand Identity – Home of the Greatest in Graphic & Brand Design
Since 2018, torso electronics has made electronic musical instruments in Copenhagen, and built the packaging and much of the brand around them itself, too. As the range grew beyond a single instrument, the company partnered with Ozon Studio, a creative studio in Amsterdam and Groningen, to give more structure to what was already there rather than start from scratch. That structure starts with the vertical line inside torso’s t|so mark, which is now both a divider and a connector across layouts, iconography and motion. In this interview, Ozon Studio’s Co-founders Tim Tijink and Brent van den Elshout, with torso electronics’ CEO Lars Buchholtz Jensen and Marketing Lead Rikard Stål, talk about where refinement ends, and rebranding begins, and what it takes for product thinking and brand design to work as one.
TBI Hi Brent, Tim, Lars and Rikard, how are you?
OS We’re good. There’s a lot in motion. Somehow, summer always ends up being peak season for the studio. The team is growing, and some interesting projects are taking shape across product, technology and culture. While being in a busy period, we continue to revisit quieter places for a while out in nature. That alternation between time in the studio and time away works well for us.
TE We’re doing great! It’s been a very busy and rewarding period for us, with a lot of exciting things currently taking shape. We’re excited about where torso is heading and happy to be here with Ozon.
TBI Lars and Rikard, how did you start working with Ozon Studio?
TE We first got to know Brent through Minimal Collective, which had featured our work some time earlier. We connected quickly through a shared interest in technology, culture and music. When we later started looking for someone to help us develop the brand, Ozon felt like a natural fit. They already understood the cultural context around torso, so we could begin from a place of shared understanding rather than having to explain the world around the company from scratch.
TBI Some projects call for evolving an identity that already exists rather than starting from scratch. Where’s the line between refining and rebranding, and when do you push for one over the other?
OS A rebrand often begins when the existing identity no longer serves the company. A refinement begins with a different question – what is already valuable, and what needs more structure to carry the brand forward?
With torso, we initially explored broader and more expressive generative directions. That process revealed that the most distinctive idea was already present in the existing t|so mark and in the design philosophy of the instruments themselves.
The work became less about introducing a new idea and more about making an existing one work harder. For us, refinement is not a smaller form of branding. It requires precision. Every intervention has to strengthen the character that is already there rather than replacing it.
We did not need a new identity. We needed a clearer foundation.
TBI With torso, the brief was to build on what they already had rather than replace it. From each side, why was that the right call?
TE We have always had a do-it-yourself mentality. Beyond designing the instruments, we built everything ourselves, from the packaging to the website. That gave us a strong sense of ownership, but it also meant that every new project started from an almost blank page. We were spending too much energy deciding how torso should look and speak each time, rather than building from something established.
We did not need a new identity. We needed a clearer foundation that could make the work more focused, consistent and easier to carry forward.
OS At first, we didn’t know whether it was the right call. The brief gave us a starting point, but the direction had to emerge through the work. We spent time with the founders and went back to day one – why the company exists, what the product does for people and where it fits in the market. We used the instruments ourselves, studied their interfaces and design logic, and looked closely at the wider market and the people using them.
What became clear was that torso’s product philosophy was already highly developed, but hadn’t yet been brought together in a complete brand system. The existing name and mark were already recognised, and the company had built a committed audience. torso didn’t need a different personality; it needed that personality to be expressed more clearly across a growing portfolio and brand experience.
TBI How do you go about translating product thinking into a coherent brand expression?
OS It started with identifying the qualities that make torso distinctive. The instruments combine high-end precision with accessibility. They feel minimal yet technically deep, systematic and open to discovery. Those qualities became a filter for decisions across typography, colour, language, hierarchy and interaction. Coherence comes from letting every touchpoint behave according to the same principles.
TBI Much of torso’s character lives in how the hardware behaves. It’s precise, reductive and system-driven. How did you translate the way the instruments work into a graphic language?
OS We did not translate the instrument by imitating its physical appearance. We translated the way it behaves. torso’s instruments make complex systems feel immediate. Clear physical controls open into much deeper digital possibilities. That balance between clarity and depth became an important principle for the identity.
The vertical line from the original t|so mark became both a divider and a connector, creating structure across layouts, iconography and motion. A boxed notation system brings current and future model names into one recognisable product hierarchy. Aeonik carries the more expressive brand communication, while Px Grotesk Mono handles technical information across interfaces and functional applications.
Built from the same vertical line, the icons use consistent weights and spacing across communication, digital interfaces and the hardware itself. This gives users a familiar visual language from discovering an instrument to actually using it.
The predominantly monochrome identity allows the hardware to lead, with colour acting as a functional signal. Together, these elements give the identity the same clarity, rhythm and underlying depth as the instruments.
First, we learn to speak the company’s existing language.
TBI When a company already has a strong design philosophy of its own, how do you sharpen and extend it?
OS We think of it as becoming bilingual. First, we learn to speak the company’s existing language. Then we help it become clearer and more consistent as the company grows.
Understanding its grammar allows us to recognise what is essential, where inconsistencies have appeared and what is still missing. Our role is to help the company speak with greater precision and impact.
TBI Lars and Rikard, what did Ozon notice about torso that you hadn’t seen yourselves?
TE They helped us see that the character of torso extended beyond the instruments themselves. It was present in our approach to technology, the artists we worked with, the references we were drawn to and the way we wanted people to experience the company.
From the inside, those choices had always felt instinctive and somewhat separate. Ozon showed us how they connected and formed a more distinct point of view than we had realised.
TBI torso’s instruments make music through generative, rule-based processes. How much did you want the identity to behave the same way, as a system that generates its own artwork?
OS We were more interested in augmentation than generation for its own sake. Endless variation becomes meaningful when it operates within a clear logic. We established that logic by hand through the vertical line, its weight and spacing, the grid and the relationship between repetition and contrast. Within that foundation, patterns and motion can be generated, modulated and iterated while remaining connected to the identity.
The toolkit allows the torso team to create new forms of their own, and could work with or without audio. Like the instrument, the system opens possibilities while leaving people to set the parameters and decide what carries meaning.
TBI torso has grown beyond a single instrument. What did you need the brand to do that it didn’t have to before?
TE When torso was built around a single instrument, the product could carry much of the brand on its own. As we grew, the brand needed to connect our instruments through a shared point of view and extend into the wider experience around them.
We’ve spent a lot of time asking what feels inherently torso in the way we communicate, teach, host events, support artists and build community. We want to support people throughout their journey as music makers, wherever they are, and we put a great deal of energy into the experience around the instruments.
Ultimately, the brand needed to express the same values as our instruments: openness, depth, immediacy and room for individual expression. It now communicates what we make as well as the kind of culture we want to help create around music-making.
TBI When product thinking and brand design genuinely work as one, what makes the difference?
TE For us, it comes down to involving both perspectives early enough that they can genuinely influence each other. The way an instrument behaves affects how we explain it, introduce it, teach it, and support it. At the same time, thinking about the wider experience can reveal things the product itself needs to communicate more clearly.
When those conversations happen throughout the process, rather than at the end, the result feels much more natural. The instrument and everything around it become different expressions of the same intent.
OS That shared intent matters because the brand makes a promise that the product ultimately has to fulfil. When behaviour, expression and company decisions align, coherence becomes something people experience rather than simply see. That is where trust begins.
More and more of what we see is measured, optimised and generated.
TBI Brent and Tim, what did working with torso teach you about how you want to work as a design studio?
Working with torso confirmed that we want to work closely with product-led companies that aim to offer something genuinely distinct. In our generative age, brand expression is becoming increasingly homogenous. More and more of what we see is measured, optimized, and generated. Real distinction still comes from the product and the culture around it. Our role is to find and translate these qualities without losing their unique character, allowing companies to make a lasting impact.