Designwith thegravityof anorth star.
Northstar is a four-person studio building brand systems, product surfaces, and motion for software companies that refuse to look like everyone else. Engagements run six to fourteen weeks.
- 47.2%
- avg lift in trial conversion
- 14
- weeks median engagement
- 2017
- founded in Lisbon
Three ways
we work together.
Honest rates, honest scopes. Every engagement starts with a 90-minute discovery call before either side signs anything.
Atlas
Tier 01A focused two-week sprint for a single, well-scoped surface — landing, identity refresh, or a contained product flow.
- One designer + art director
- Two synchronous reviews / week
- Figma source + production handoff
- Two rounds of refinement
Vector
Tier 02Our most chosen engagement. A full pod working alongside your team for compounding output across brand and product.
- Designer, art director, motion lead
- Weekly working sessions
- Brand system + component library
- Motion principles document
- Loom critiques between sessions
Constellation
Tier 03For teams rebuilding identity, product, and marketing in parallel. A dedicated pod and an embedded strategist.
- Embedded strategist
- Dedicated four-person pod
- Quarterly research cadence
- Custom motion + 3D systems
- Priority access to founders
The teams we've made things with.
We work small on purpose — fewer, longer relationships. Most of our clients return for a second engagement within eighteen months.
Northstar treated our identity like an operating system rather than a logo. Eight months later our marketing team still ships from the same set of primitives.
They asked harder product questions than our PMs. The motion principles document alone is the cleanest internal artifact we own.
Trial conversion lifted 47.2% in the quarter after launch — and not from a growth hack. It was the design clarity.
The kindest, sharpest critique partners I have hired. They will tell you the truth about your product, gently, in week one.
The things we get asked,
answered honestly.
If you have a question that isn't here, write to us and a partner will reply within two business days.
Four full-time partners and a rotating bench of two collaborators we have worked with for years. We never staff more than three concurrent engagements.
Let's draw
thefirst line.
Tell us what you're building, who it's for, and what is already in the room. We reply personally within two business days. No forms, no funnels.