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Studio — Ancoats, Manchester
A studio built like a workshop
Foundry North was started in 2016 by Nell Ashworth in a rented corner of a former iron foundry in Ancoats — a desk, a press-cut sign, and a conviction that the companies who make real things deserve better than decorative branding. The first client was a valve manufacturer. The second was a brewery. The pattern stuck.
Nine years on, we're twelve people in the same building with considerably more desks. We design brand identities, digital products, and websites — and we build what we design, in-house, because handing a design to someone else to interpret is where most good work dies.
We stay deliberately small and take on eight to ten projects a year. Small means the people who pitch the work are the people who make it. It also means we say no often, and mean it kindly.
2016Founded in Ancoats, Manchester
12People, one building, no account layer
84Projects shipped to date
8–10Projects taken on per year
Principles
What we won't budge on
01
Evidence over adjectives
Work is judged by what it changes — enquiries, activation, sell-through — not by how it photographs. Every case study on this site leads with the outcome, and we report the misses to clients as plainly as the wins.
02
Build what you design
Design and engineering sit at the same tables in the same room. Nothing ships that the people who designed it didn't help build, and nothing gets designed that can't be built well.
03
The boring pages matter most
Specification sheets, empty carts, 404s, terms of service. Trust is won on the pages nobody screenshots, so we design those first and the homepage last.
04
Small on purpose
No account managers, no pitch teams, no juniors learning on your budget. You work with the same five or six people from brief to launch, and you can name all of them.
People
Who does the work
Nell Ashworth
Founder & Creative Director
Started Foundry North after eight years directing identity work for industrial clients in London and deciding the North deserved its own heavyweight studio. Still takes every first client call herself.
Dominic Okafor
Design Director
Leads the identity practice. Ex-signage designer with an enduring grudge against typefaces that fail at forty metres. Responsible for most of the studio's loudest work and all of its quietest kerning.
Priya Raghavan
Technical Director
Runs the build side of the studio. Formerly an engineer on warehouse logistics software, which is why every Foundry North site is fast on bad connections and honest about its error states.
Callum Rhodes
Senior Brand Designer
Identity systems, packaging, and the studio's resident production supervisor. Has attended more press checks than birthdays and considers this the correct ratio.
Weronika Zając
Senior Product Designer
Leads product design on software engagements. Spent four years designing clinical tools, and brings that discipline — accessibility first, evidence always — to everything from fintech to archives.
Sam Teale
Studio Manager
Keeps twelve people, eight projects, and one ancient Risograph running on schedule. The reason clients describe working with us as 'unnervingly organised'.
Plus six more designers, engineers, and a workshop dog named Rivet, who prefer the work to the spotlight.
Recognition
On the record
- 2025Identity of the YearType & Form AnnualHalvard Marine
- 2025Product Design HonoreeInterface ReviewLedgerline
- 2024Best E-commerce ExperienceEuropean Digital Craft AwardsSlate & Ember
- 2024Wayfinding & TransitCivic Design PrizeTern Transit
- 2024Studio of the Year — ShortlistNorthern Creative CircleFoundry North
- 2023Digital Typography — CommendationType & Form AnnualNorthern Print Archive
Clients
Companies that make things
- Halvard Marine
- Ledgerline
- Tern Transit
- Slate & Ember
- Moor Audio
- Northern Print Archive
- Fenwick Brewing Co.
- Roke Outdoor
- Aldercap
- Calder Valley Mills
- Bridgehouse Optics
- Wren & Card
A note on the studio: Foundry North is fictional. This site is a demonstration built on the HubZero Blueprint ecosystem, showing what production-quality engineering, design, and content look like in a working portfolio — not a real business.
Eight to ten projects a year. Currently scheduling work for next quarter.
Start something →newwork@foundrynorth.example · +44 161 496 0233