Responses by Sam Howard, creative director, Koto; Sam Loomes, founder, Good City; and Anton Martinez, digital creative director, Koto.

Background: “Seasoned was born out of a desire to address the barriers to entering the creative industry,” says Sam Howard. “It often feels impenetrable, requiring resources or connections many don’t have access to. High academic thresholds, the need to live in major design hubs like London and a lack of clear guidance all contribute to these obstacles. While we’re not tackling all of these, we wanted to create something that could help—in a fun, engaging way—to demystify branding and make creative careers and the industry more transparent. It’s designed for students, emerging creatives and individuals from underrepresented backgrounds who are trying to access the creative industry.”

Design core: “We often tend to oversimplify digital experiences, so it was refreshing to do just the opposite with this site,” says Anton Martinez. “A witty copy line, a logo made of mustard or burnt toast popping up at the end of the homepage—every idea felt both right and a little weird at the same time, shaping every interaction and detail of the site. That quirkiness is exactly what makes it special.”

Favorite details: “The Seasoned logo on the hot dog, the scribbles that appear on screen, the way that the textures tie everything together—there are so many little moments, but the toast is probably one of my favorites,” says Martinez. “I remember sitting in a feedback session, discussing how it should sync with the scroll position, and laughing to myself, thinking I had probably reached a career peak. We thought it would make for a great send-off moment, so it was definitely worth the effort.”

Challenges: “Performance was something we focused on from the very beginning,” Martinez says. “There were constant reminders of this, either by finding ways to bring this textural world to the screen while keeping the site lightweight or filling the experience with playful interactions without interfering with the content. with a noncommercial project, it’s easy to get a little too relaxed about these things, but we made sure not to.”

Navigation structure: “We wanted to keep the site as simple as it is playful, so we prioritized long scrolls over a more traditional navigation,” says Martinez. “It felt like the right choice, especially for the audience we designed it for. Based on that, we defined two distinct levels: the homepage, where users navigate vertically, and the books, where the reading experience shifts to a horizontal flow—almost mimicking the way you’d read an actual book.”

Technology: “Seasoned is built on a WordPress back end,” says Sam Loomes. “The front end is built using a vanilla JavaScript base with Tailwind styling. Simple animations were handled with CSS, while GSAP facilitated the page transitions and scroll-based animations. We used Matter.js as a physics engine. It was important to spend a lot of time optimizing the assets to ensure that everything loaded quickly and the end user’s experience felt smooth.”