Studioenok’s identity for Ceelike breaks oral care conventions — The Brand Identity – Home of the Greatest in Graphic & Brand Design
Oral care occupies an unusual space in the consumer landscape. Products enter the body, exist in private moments and connect to deeply sensory experiences – yet the category’s visual language has long defaulted to clinical blues, icy metaphors and medical symbolism. For Ceelike, an oral care brand entering the US market, Shenzhen-based studio Studioenok saw an opportunity to reposition the category entirely, developing an identity that treats oral care less as a clinical necessity and more as an extension of contemporary beauty rituals.
The resulting visual system spans both lifestyle products and professional offerings, united by what Founder & Art Director Yimin Zhao describes as “soft science” – an identity that holds scientific credibility and everyday warmth in careful balance. “The brand speaks about efficacy and material science, but it also lives in moments that are intimate, human and close to the body,” Zhao explains. “The typography therefore had to feel precise without becoming clinical, and warm without drifting into cuteness.”
That balance manifests most clearly in the typographic approach. Good Sans, a rounded sans serif, provides the foundation across all applications. “Its geometric structure provides clarity and stability, while its softened terminals introduce a subtle playfulness that keeps the tone approachable,” notes Zhao. The custom wordmark replaces the ‘i’ with an exclamation point, a small detail that reinforces Ceelike’s more expressive positioning whilst maintaining legibility.
Perhaps the most striking departure from oral-care conventions appears in the colour palette. Where competitors rely on whites and blues to signal cleanliness, Ceelike deploys mint, yellow, orange and lime green across its lifestyle range. “The palette wasn’t derived from oral-care conventions,” Zhao explains. “We built it using a beauty-care logic, where colour acts as a structural tool. High-saturation colours reflect how users actually choose Ceelike products – through flavour, routine and emotional familiarity rather than clinical cues.”
This vibrant approach might seem at odds with scientific credibility, but Zhao maintains that rigour comes from structure, not colour. “The grid, typographic hierarchy and compositional discipline remain constant across the entire range. This lets bright colours exist inside a precise framework, keeping the identity contemporary, warm and still rigorous.”
The system’s flexibility emerges from controlled variables rather than separate design languages. Three constants anchor everything: typographic hierarchy, grid discipline and informational clarity. “The lifestyle line expands colour and spacing to feel warmer and more expressive, while the professional line tightens composition and reduces the palette to emphasise precision,” Zhao notes. “Both lines remain part of one system – one emotional, one functional – without breaking the underlying logic.”
Recurring symbols appear throughout the packaging, though not as fixed brand marks. Each icon derives from specific product characteristics: a palm tree references coconut oil in teeth-whitening strips, whilst a compact block form on solid toothpaste packaging reflects its tablet-like structure. On oral spray products, symbols capture the visual rhythm of mist. “Although their meanings differ, their consistency comes from a shared visual grammar: all symbols are built from small circular modules,” Zhao explains. “This gives them a soft, approachable texture while allowing each form to remain specific to its product.”
The Kiss Artifact oral spray bottles feature distinctive spherical caps, developed through what Zhao describes as “the lens of beauty culture.” The intention was to move oral care away from utilitarian language and place it closer to the emotional world of fragrance and cosmetics. “For Ceelike’s predominantly female audience, familiarity plays an important role. The rounded form carries the softness and sensorial quality found in perfume caps and makeup objects – shapes that already exist in their daily personal-care rituals.”
This positioning extends beyond aesthetics into strategic territory. As Ceelike enters the competitive US market, Zhao and the team deliberately stepped away from what they saw as intrusive visual codes. “Oral care is one of the most intimate product categories,” Zhao reflects. “In this context, loud, aggressive or overly performative visual language can feel intrusive. For us, restraint is not a stylistic choice – it is a position, and a form of respect.”
“The role of design is not to dominate attention,” Zhao concludes, "but to support a more natural relationship between person and product.” Through its holistic visual system, Studioenok has crafted an identity that expands the visual expectations of oral care, presenting Ceelike as a brand that is attentive, contemporary and quietly expressive.