Director, Global Editorial and Copy
 In-house · 2023

Banana Republic

Moving Banana Republic from legacy retailer to premium lifestyle brand.

Banana Republic was founded in 1978 on travel, discovery and things collected around the world. Four decades on, the signals that built the brand had faded into familiarity. Customers knew it for workwear: dependable, but generic.

The mandate: reposition Banana Republic as a premium lifestyle brand, rearticulate its voice, and prove the change in every channel at once, from campaign to product page to store floor, across both Banana Republic and Banana Republic Factory.

❋ Insights & Vision

A lifestyle brand can't be declared. It has to show up in every category, channel and sentence. Exploration, the brand's founding idea, still held. What had dated was the safari costume around it. We kept the curiosity, rebuilt the platform on the brand's San Francisco roots, and codified it into a voice every team could write to.

❋ Voice & Writing System

I authored and owned the 2023 Brand Voice and Writing Guidelines for Banana Republic and Banana Republic Factory: four voice principles, a distinct tone for each business, and writing standards for every format from campaign to product page.

The system also installed how the work gets made: a product-writing framework built on fabric, fit and function, a three-question edit, and a self, peer and manager review model. It was written to the brand's new target customer, so every writer, agency and partner wrote to the same person.

❋ Business Impact

I co-led the 50-person creative organization through the repositioning, partnering with the VP of Creative and the executive team on the brand platform.

I authored the voice and writing system every writer across both businesses worked to, installed the editorial standards and review model behind it, and led the editorial team that carried the new voice into home, editorial and a designer collaboration.

❋ During My Tenure

  • New voice and writing system for Banana Republic and Banana Republic Factory

  • 2023 Brand Vision for the senior leadership team

  • BR Home launched across every channel at once, covered by Vogue, WWD, The Hollywood Reporter and Homes & Gardens

  • Banana Republic x Peter Do capsule collection launch

Five models dressed in black and white fashion standing in a line on a cracked concrete surface by a body of water at sunset.
An inspirational quote about choosing clothing styles, emphasizing classic shirts, trousers, and tailored jackets, expressing confidence and legacy, with a logo at the bottom reading 'CLASSICS BR EST 1978'.
A woman with braided hair wearing a beige double-breasted blazer and matching pants standing outdoors in a field of tall grass.
A woman with long hair sitting on a haystack under a partly cloudy sky, touching her face with one hand and extending her arm outward.
Open magazine featuring a two-page spread. The left page displays a brown upholstered armchair and a beige woven pendant light overhead, with a textured gray wall background. The right page contains black text on a white background, starting with the phrase "We traveled everywhere to take you somewhere you never imagined" and includes details about a collection of furnishings and art.