of the United Kingdom’s capitol city.
You’ve heard this lament a thousand times already: “Every eCommerce site looks the same.”
More progressive corners of the interwebs have been banging this drum for ages. (You’ve likely even read it on this site.) But we, as individuals and as an industry, have not done much to correct it.
Despite eCommerce being a mature, nearly ancient, discipline, most professionals still live and practice in fear. We still have night terrors about customers failing to spot the hamburger menu, CTAs hiding in the dark, and users getting so lost in a checkout maze that they abandon their carts completely.
Destroy all friction!
Avoid cognitive load.
Apply best practices.
Genuflect to UI conventions.
Preach by the grid.
Everything standard, please.
This is the gospel of Ecommerce Absolutism, which inevitably led us to digital non-places that swiftly convert the already converted while doing precisely nothing to convince those who still need some convincing.
That’s the missed opportunity, in square business terms: the digital flagships we have today only cater to high-intent buyers. Everyone else is better off finding motivation elsewhere.
A State of Digital Monotony
We are obviously stuck.
Ecommerce thinking occasionally reaches for the sublime (oblique Future Commerce’s flex), yet the actual practice still largely treats eCommerce as a digestive issue, a chore to be optimized, and an existing demand to be captured. Brand identity, product discovery, and serendipity — all the things that create desire — are best done elsewhere, by “other teams.”
What’s stopping eCommerce practitioners from doing better? Based on my personal experience, there are five reasons that fall within cultural, psychological, and organizational buckets.
1. Dashboard culture
“Dashboard culture” encapsulates our very contemporary obsessions with numbers, figures, and KPIs. Not as a means to an end but, rather, as a substitute for reality. KPIs become idols. They’re no longer a proxy for something bigger but, rather, the end goal.
Every decision must be data-driven or data-backed. To some, this is a way to “check our work” and validate our investments. But in my view, it’s a convenient way to chicken out of the decision-making itself.
When it comes to designing an eCommerce site, or anything really, data-backed evidence and true innovation tend to live on opposite sides of the field. You will never deviate from the norm, or effectively experiment to stray from it, if you need a robust analytics report to reassure you. Cat How recently wrote a brilliant article on this idea, and how data-backed design can actually kill new ideas before they show their potential.
2. Silos
Our industry loves to pontificate about cross-department collaboration, but eCommerce projects are typically led by eCommerce/digital teams, with marketing, creative, and image departments being “consulted,” often quite begrudgingly.
While eCommerce and digital teams ensure brand sites are built to drive conversions and boost sales, a true digital flagship is so much more than a point of sale. In actuality, it’s the most visible incarnation of the brand. It’s a communication touchpoint and a desire-building engine, not just a low-funnel converter. And yet the “low-funnel” mindset is solely in charge, with lower-funnel KPIs attached as proof.
Without a rebalancing of ownership, how can we expect any outcome different than the over-optimized template we’ve seen time and time again?
3. The content alibi
If I had a penny for every time I heard, “it’s all about content,” I would be able to match Anthropic’s pre-IPO valuation.
Thanks to this all-too-common mantra, the look and feel of websites rest upon the heavy shoulders of the content load. As a result, the interface is deliberately anesthetized so the “content” can supposedly shine. That logic quietly legitimizes the design of non-places (minimal shelving, neutral everything) on the assumption that images will do the heavy lifting. This is both an insult to design and an invitation to think small. It’s a deep failure of imagination.
With the notable exception of Zara, most eCommerce operations I know treat photography as an industrial pipeline that’s now further turbocharged by AI. Then, there’s a bit of perfunctory editorial on top, usually upcycled from campaigns or social media. If that’s your supposed “emotional engine,” it’s no surprise the experience runs light on actual feeling.
4. The tech alibi
Most eCommerce professionals consider themselves to be innovators. Which is to say that, at a philosophical level, they prize innovation. The only issue is that “innovation” is usually a byword for “tech innovation,” where platforms, apps, agentic bric-a-brac, AI wrappers, and snake-oil vendors promise to fix brands’ every pain point, from up-sells to returns.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with testing new solutions and piecing together a tech stack that can help bring your brand vision to life. But the act of selling is primarily about psychology, rituals, and narratives. Without these more intangible parts, you are left with a bloated stack, a utilitarian design, and a conversion machine that only does demand capture. Which is precisely why we’re collectively standing where we are today.
5. Lack of courage
When it comes to contrarian thinking, nodding along with the fray is easy, almost fashionable. But acting and actually doing something about the problems plaguing our industry requires some actual guts. There must be a willingness to put up a political fight and own the risk of an “experiment” not working — or at least not working instantly. It is terra incognita, and most managers don’t like it there.
You need a bit of a visionary. A Shackleton-like manager that allows for some drama: “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.” That kind of vibe.
Have I ever met somebody like that in the many companies I worked with? Yes. They usually sit at the top and, even there, represent a small minority. Did I ever meet the equivalent in the eCommerce or digital space? Not. Once.
So maybe you see where this is going….
What are the traits of an eCommerce site that doesn’t look like any other?
Things are so bleak that I honestly cannot come up with a fully realized example.
Yes, some people are having fun with eCommerce. More often, though, it’s people naïve enough to broach the topic without the extra baggage and the ingrained thinking that come from best practices and too many Shoptalks. And usually the fun is limited in size, scope, or both.
A brand may be so small it barely registers in cultural terms. Or the experiment could be confined to a special landing page that barely gets any traffic. These are exceptions to the rule, and they’re not representative of an actual, cohesive movement.
I have a special folder where I collect these little pockets of all-too-rare eCommerce dissent. Famine makes the eyes go hungry, so I will take every little morsel that comes my way.
Here is one example. An X post highlighting several skate brands' websites. Admittedly, there is a lot to like. Raw, dense, and obviously referencing early-aughts web design and SoCal skate culture, they feel more authentic and on-brand than most websites. I’m sure CRO fundamentalists will have issues with them. How punk is that!
Earlier in the year, eCommerce dissidents fell in love with Hermès’ redesign. To be fair, this was more than an actual redesign; it was one of those periodic artist takeovers that Hermès does. And for the occasion, the whole website hosted a series of illustrations by Linda Merad, shown side by side with the usual photography. As of now, the site is largely back to normal.
On one level, you could file this under “the content alibi”: dressing the windows while leaving everything else untouched. But on another level, if you squint and treat the glass as half full, you can just about see the first shoots of what I’d call Digital Craft.
Digital Craft: Artisanal Design As an Act of Rebellion
Digital Craft is one way we can make eCommerce more interesting, both visually and culturally. At the very least, it’s part of the solution.
What I like about this term is that it immediately suggests quality and refinement. I refuse to believe that the only escape from the sea of sameness is to cosplay Geocities or hide behind an anti‑design full of doodles and pixelated scraps. The distinction matters.
In my definition, Digital Craft is an act of rebellion because it refuses the shortcut of using standard parts: familiar icon sets, neutral backgrounds, fine lines, and generic layout primitives. Each part is bespoke, reflecting a single vision, a clear intention, and hours of (extra) work.
Digital Craft isn’t what Hermès did. It’s what Hermès does with its products and stores, including its windows. It’s having magical, even manic details throughout, to both signal a difference and raise a smile.
Digital Craft is backgrounds treated as textured surfaces, sound design and clever animations, narratives instead of bulk-loaded copywriting, and navigation tools paired with editorial detours. It’s on-site agents, if you must, that act like personal shoppers, not a glorified Clippy.
Perhaps at this stage, a long-overdue disclaimer is in order: this is not for everybody. Commodities and products that have no emotional connection whatsoever can do with websites to match (that is, soulless converters). No need to waste money on eccentric notions such as “eCommerce having a character.”
But brands that are targeting a passion more than a user need to step up their eCommerce game by being artisanal. By being leftfield and doing things with just as much passion. Transactions will follow, as they usually follow desire.
Will the Ecommerce People Please Take One Step Back?
Let us assume that you, reader, are in a position to effect change. In all likelihood, you sit “above” the traditional eCommerce hierarchy.
You may be asking many questions, such as "How do we make eCommerce interesting?" How do we make Digital Craft a reality? How do we overcome the five forces that keep eCommerce trapped in this sea of sameness?
Well, maybe we ditch the eCommerce people.
(Pause for effect)
Or rather, we change the way we work so that traditional eCommerce thinking isn’t the only mode of thinking. Especially not at the beginning.
Put bluntly, projects for the kinds of brands I’m talking about should not begin with the usual eCommerce cast (chief digital officers, omnichannel czars, chief experience officers, etc.). They’re essential, but later, when there’s something to engineer, operate, and optimize. At the start, you need to be thinking further upstream, higher on the conceptual ladder.
It’s a bit like building a house. You can go straight to the construction company, and they will build something decent for you. But if you are more ambitious, you need an architectural firm.
This is why we are stuck. We have been building websites by going straight to the construction firm. The reliable pragmatists. What did we get? No-nonsense places that…function.
I hate to reference the past because you end up sounding nostalgic, but Prada’s legendary “Vomit” website was conceived by OMA and 2x4, not a Shopify premium partner.
It was a concept (not even a URL one, if we want to be specific), long before it became a website. A graphic-architectural system that bled across screens, with heavily researched foundations.
Concept and Research were, and still are, the key notions here. Traditional eCommerce teams should take a step back so the process can evolve to enable them.
Digital flagships should be carefully researched and conceptualized long before they are designed, coded, and integrated. In the age of AI, with design and coding timelines compressed, one should have time to do a bit of thinking, right? And this type of thinking requires a fundamentally different skill set from that of traditional eCommerce practitioners. It’s about culture. It’s about aesthetics. It’s about strategy.
Every eCommerce project should then start with a stand-alone research and conceptualization phase that culminates in a single integrated brief. Agencies on the receiving end should then be encouraged to think holistically about culture, visuals, features, commercial goals, technological possibilities, and brand narratives. There’s some eCommerce thinking, but it’s mixed with other modes of thinking. Mix the gene pool a bit, and let some fresh air into the room.
Depending on how your brand is structured, the resulting concepts should be discussed not just with the Ecommerce Director but with the Creative Director, the Image Department, the Chief Marketing Officer, and the CEO. It should be clear from the initial brief that the flagship must be both a conversion engine and a place of cult, with neither overshadowing the other.
The actual design, the final architecture, the roadmap, and the budget scenarios come later. At that stage, the “classic” eCommerce team can take over, with just enough external control to ensure that the concept remains front and center. (And there should be zero tolerance for malicious compliance or hijacking.)
Since a digital flagship is a living organism, periodic reviews and evolutions should be scheduled, considering multiple perspectives once again, not just an A/B test proving that bigger CTAs get more clicks.
This is only a rough template, of course, but it’s one any brand can steal from. By injecting more thinking and curiosity into the process, we can drag a tired practice toward cultural relevance. And we can get digital flagships that creative directors are proud to claim as part of their oeuvre.
When Websites Become Storefronts: A Conversation with Andrea Tognon
This piece ends with one last provocation, linking back directly to the title.
I made a case, hopefully, for the need to “think” before you code or design. For behaving less like a nuts-and-bolts agency and more like an architectural firm. That’s why I decided to step outside the metaphor and ask an actual architect. Someone who designs places with a genuine sense of place.
Andrea Tognon is a highly respected architect who has been crafting store designs and spatial narratives for a long list of luxury brands, including Céline, Max Mara, Bottega Veneta, and Jil Sander.
Our conversation took place in his beautiful studio—a former theatre that now looks like a brutalist cathedral that instantly made me think of Ricardo Bofill’s cement-factory-turned-workspace, only this one comes with a small family of ducks roaming the garden. The setting delivered the first lesson: spaces can both energize you and shape how you think. This is yet another reason to resist the scourge of “non-places,” both physically and online.
Tognon’s practice sits at the intersection of architecture and research. While far removed from the eCommerce space, he’s exactly the kind of person I’d love to involve in the conceptual phase of a major eCommerce redesign, sitting alongside more canonical choices.
After the conversation, one quote stayed with me because it speaks volumes about the architect’s ability to think conceptually: “When designing a chair, you never start with a chair.” Inspiration rarely takes the literal path. It could come from a crack in the pavement, or maybe a book you just read. Come to think of it, literalism, or benchmarking reduced to looking at what the closest competitors are doing, is one more issue affecting the eCommerce practice.
Tognon spoke about store design cycling through eras and archetypes. The store as a “palazzo.” The store as an apartment, or even a gallery. And lest we forget, the store that treats the product as a piece of art to be glorified, or sees itself as part of the artwork. Eventually, the store goes back to thinking of itself as a store. All the while I was thinking, “an eCommerce is an eCommerce is an eCommerce.” Very rarely do I see the initial research (if it even exists) pondering the form factor.
Tognon walked me through an excursus of fashion’s most iconic stores. I’m using the word “iconic” deliberately because the idea of an equally iconic webstore still feels pretty far‑fetched: Commes des Garçons’ Chelsea boutique, designed to be an extension of Chelsea’s gallery culture. John Pawson’s flagship for Calvin Klein, which was a monument to minimalism and a place that had people wondering, “Where are the display windows? Where are the shopping racks?” Or Prada’s Epicenter, a space porous to events, crowds, and performances.
For comparison, we pulled up a handful of luxury websites, all of which applied the same kind of non‑offensive, near‑invisible design. There were a few smart details, such as Lemaire’s gently disorienting layouts and playlists, an illustrated icon link on Loewe.com. But overall, the grid still ruled each page, acting as a neat little stand‑in for prison bars.
Tognon said one more thing that created an intellectual full-circle moment. “When I’m doing a flagship, there is almost invariably a request to do something that doesn’t exist yet. To ‘push the envelope,’ and to do a lot of research.”
There it is again: research and a willingness to experiment. This is how we depart from modest, hyper-pragmatic, and dogmatic mindsets that hinder innovation.
But both must be done with intention, because Tognon believes that a store should respond to its context, not just the brand or the space’s intent. This opens up a whole new layer to the conversation because the internet has no context. There is no Omotesando internet and Montenapoleone internet. Or maybe, we just haven’t learned how to design those “streets” yet.
Does Tognon have the ultimate formula for designing our eCommerce experiences? Of course not. Because, aside from the provocation of the title, there is no formula. You don’t make iconic work, or even moderately interesting work, by being formulaic. Each project is different, and that’s exactly how it should be.
You just need an architect’s eye, curiosity, and creativity. Only then can we create digital flagships that earn their place in consumers’ minds.
You’ve heard this lament a thousand times already: “Every eCommerce site looks the same.”
More progressive corners of the interwebs have been banging this drum for ages. (You’ve likely even read it on this site.) But we, as individuals and as an industry, have not done much to correct it.
Despite eCommerce being a mature, nearly ancient, discipline, most professionals still live and practice in fear. We still have night terrors about customers failing to spot the hamburger menu, CTAs hiding in the dark, and users getting so lost in a checkout maze that they abandon their carts completely.
Destroy all friction!
Avoid cognitive load.
Apply best practices.
Genuflect to UI conventions.
Preach by the grid.
Everything standard, please.
This is the gospel of Ecommerce Absolutism, which inevitably led us to digital non-places that swiftly convert the already converted while doing precisely nothing to convince those who still need some convincing.
That’s the missed opportunity, in square business terms: the digital flagships we have today only cater to high-intent buyers. Everyone else is better off finding motivation elsewhere.
A State of Digital Monotony
We are obviously stuck.
Ecommerce thinking occasionally reaches for the sublime (oblique Future Commerce’s flex), yet the actual practice still largely treats eCommerce as a digestive issue, a chore to be optimized, and an existing demand to be captured. Brand identity, product discovery, and serendipity — all the things that create desire — are best done elsewhere, by “other teams.”
What’s stopping eCommerce practitioners from doing better? Based on my personal experience, there are five reasons that fall within cultural, psychological, and organizational buckets.
1. Dashboard culture
“Dashboard culture” encapsulates our very contemporary obsessions with numbers, figures, and KPIs. Not as a means to an end but, rather, as a substitute for reality. KPIs become idols. They’re no longer a proxy for something bigger but, rather, the end goal.
Every decision must be data-driven or data-backed. To some, this is a way to “check our work” and validate our investments. But in my view, it’s a convenient way to chicken out of the decision-making itself.
When it comes to designing an eCommerce site, or anything really, data-backed evidence and true innovation tend to live on opposite sides of the field. You will never deviate from the norm, or effectively experiment to stray from it, if you need a robust analytics report to reassure you. Cat How recently wrote a brilliant article on this idea, and how data-backed design can actually kill new ideas before they show their potential.
2. Silos
Our industry loves to pontificate about cross-department collaboration, but eCommerce projects are typically led by eCommerce/digital teams, with marketing, creative, and image departments being “consulted,” often quite begrudgingly.
While eCommerce and digital teams ensure brand sites are built to drive conversions and boost sales, a true digital flagship is so much more than a point of sale. In actuality, it’s the most visible incarnation of the brand. It’s a communication touchpoint and a desire-building engine, not just a low-funnel converter. And yet the “low-funnel” mindset is solely in charge, with lower-funnel KPIs attached as proof.
Without a rebalancing of ownership, how can we expect any outcome different than the over-optimized template we’ve seen time and time again?
3. The content alibi
If I had a penny for every time I heard, “it’s all about content,” I would be able to match Anthropic’s pre-IPO valuation.
Thanks to this all-too-common mantra, the look and feel of websites rest upon the heavy shoulders of the content load. As a result, the interface is deliberately anesthetized so the “content” can supposedly shine. That logic quietly legitimizes the design of non-places (minimal shelving, neutral everything) on the assumption that images will do the heavy lifting. This is both an insult to design and an invitation to think small. It’s a deep failure of imagination.
With the notable exception of Zara, most eCommerce operations I know treat photography as an industrial pipeline that’s now further turbocharged by AI. Then, there’s a bit of perfunctory editorial on top, usually upcycled from campaigns or social media. If that’s your supposed “emotional engine,” it’s no surprise the experience runs light on actual feeling.
4. The tech alibi
Most eCommerce professionals consider themselves to be innovators. Which is to say that, at a philosophical level, they prize innovation. The only issue is that “innovation” is usually a byword for “tech innovation,” where platforms, apps, agentic bric-a-brac, AI wrappers, and snake-oil vendors promise to fix brands’ every pain point, from up-sells to returns.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with testing new solutions and piecing together a tech stack that can help bring your brand vision to life. But the act of selling is primarily about psychology, rituals, and narratives. Without these more intangible parts, you are left with a bloated stack, a utilitarian design, and a conversion machine that only does demand capture. Which is precisely why we’re collectively standing where we are today.
5. Lack of courage
When it comes to contrarian thinking, nodding along with the fray is easy, almost fashionable. But acting and actually doing something about the problems plaguing our industry requires some actual guts. There must be a willingness to put up a political fight and own the risk of an “experiment” not working — or at least not working instantly. It is terra incognita, and most managers don’t like it there.
You need a bit of a visionary. A Shackleton-like manager that allows for some drama: “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.” That kind of vibe.
Have I ever met somebody like that in the many companies I worked with? Yes. They usually sit at the top and, even there, represent a small minority. Did I ever meet the equivalent in the eCommerce or digital space? Not. Once.
So maybe you see where this is going….
What are the traits of an eCommerce site that doesn’t look like any other?
Things are so bleak that I honestly cannot come up with a fully realized example.
Yes, some people are having fun with eCommerce. More often, though, it’s people naïve enough to broach the topic without the extra baggage and the ingrained thinking that come from best practices and too many Shoptalks. And usually the fun is limited in size, scope, or both.
A brand may be so small it barely registers in cultural terms. Or the experiment could be confined to a special landing page that barely gets any traffic. These are exceptions to the rule, and they’re not representative of an actual, cohesive movement.
I have a special folder where I collect these little pockets of all-too-rare eCommerce dissent. Famine makes the eyes go hungry, so I will take every little morsel that comes my way.
Here is one example. An X post highlighting several skate brands' websites. Admittedly, there is a lot to like. Raw, dense, and obviously referencing early-aughts web design and SoCal skate culture, they feel more authentic and on-brand than most websites. I’m sure CRO fundamentalists will have issues with them. How punk is that!
Earlier in the year, eCommerce dissidents fell in love with Hermès’ redesign. To be fair, this was more than an actual redesign; it was one of those periodic artist takeovers that Hermès does. And for the occasion, the whole website hosted a series of illustrations by Linda Merad, shown side by side with the usual photography. As of now, the site is largely back to normal.
On one level, you could file this under “the content alibi”: dressing the windows while leaving everything else untouched. But on another level, if you squint and treat the glass as half full, you can just about see the first shoots of what I’d call Digital Craft.
Digital Craft: Artisanal Design As an Act of Rebellion
Digital Craft is one way we can make eCommerce more interesting, both visually and culturally. At the very least, it’s part of the solution.
What I like about this term is that it immediately suggests quality and refinement. I refuse to believe that the only escape from the sea of sameness is to cosplay Geocities or hide behind an anti‑design full of doodles and pixelated scraps. The distinction matters.
In my definition, Digital Craft is an act of rebellion because it refuses the shortcut of using standard parts: familiar icon sets, neutral backgrounds, fine lines, and generic layout primitives. Each part is bespoke, reflecting a single vision, a clear intention, and hours of (extra) work.
Digital Craft isn’t what Hermès did. It’s what Hermès does with its products and stores, including its windows. It’s having magical, even manic details throughout, to both signal a difference and raise a smile.
Digital Craft is backgrounds treated as textured surfaces, sound design and clever animations, narratives instead of bulk-loaded copywriting, and navigation tools paired with editorial detours. It’s on-site agents, if you must, that act like personal shoppers, not a glorified Clippy.
Perhaps at this stage, a long-overdue disclaimer is in order: this is not for everybody. Commodities and products that have no emotional connection whatsoever can do with websites to match (that is, soulless converters). No need to waste money on eccentric notions such as “eCommerce having a character.”
But brands that are targeting a passion more than a user need to step up their eCommerce game by being artisanal. By being leftfield and doing things with just as much passion. Transactions will follow, as they usually follow desire.
Will the Ecommerce People Please Take One Step Back?
Let us assume that you, reader, are in a position to effect change. In all likelihood, you sit “above” the traditional eCommerce hierarchy.
You may be asking many questions, such as "How do we make eCommerce interesting?" How do we make Digital Craft a reality? How do we overcome the five forces that keep eCommerce trapped in this sea of sameness?
Well, maybe we ditch the eCommerce people.
(Pause for effect)
Or rather, we change the way we work so that traditional eCommerce thinking isn’t the only mode of thinking. Especially not at the beginning.
Put bluntly, projects for the kinds of brands I’m talking about should not begin with the usual eCommerce cast (chief digital officers, omnichannel czars, chief experience officers, etc.). They’re essential, but later, when there’s something to engineer, operate, and optimize. At the start, you need to be thinking further upstream, higher on the conceptual ladder.
It’s a bit like building a house. You can go straight to the construction company, and they will build something decent for you. But if you are more ambitious, you need an architectural firm.
This is why we are stuck. We have been building websites by going straight to the construction firm. The reliable pragmatists. What did we get? No-nonsense places that…function.
I hate to reference the past because you end up sounding nostalgic, but Prada’s legendary “Vomit” website was conceived by OMA and 2x4, not a Shopify premium partner.
It was a concept (not even a URL one, if we want to be specific), long before it became a website. A graphic-architectural system that bled across screens, with heavily researched foundations.
Concept and Research were, and still are, the key notions here. Traditional eCommerce teams should take a step back so the process can evolve to enable them.
Digital flagships should be carefully researched and conceptualized long before they are designed, coded, and integrated. In the age of AI, with design and coding timelines compressed, one should have time to do a bit of thinking, right? And this type of thinking requires a fundamentally different skill set from that of traditional eCommerce practitioners. It’s about culture. It’s about aesthetics. It’s about strategy.
Every eCommerce project should then start with a stand-alone research and conceptualization phase that culminates in a single integrated brief. Agencies on the receiving end should then be encouraged to think holistically about culture, visuals, features, commercial goals, technological possibilities, and brand narratives. There’s some eCommerce thinking, but it’s mixed with other modes of thinking. Mix the gene pool a bit, and let some fresh air into the room.
Depending on how your brand is structured, the resulting concepts should be discussed not just with the Ecommerce Director but with the Creative Director, the Image Department, the Chief Marketing Officer, and the CEO. It should be clear from the initial brief that the flagship must be both a conversion engine and a place of cult, with neither overshadowing the other.
The actual design, the final architecture, the roadmap, and the budget scenarios come later. At that stage, the “classic” eCommerce team can take over, with just enough external control to ensure that the concept remains front and center. (And there should be zero tolerance for malicious compliance or hijacking.)
Since a digital flagship is a living organism, periodic reviews and evolutions should be scheduled, considering multiple perspectives once again, not just an A/B test proving that bigger CTAs get more clicks.
This is only a rough template, of course, but it’s one any brand can steal from. By injecting more thinking and curiosity into the process, we can drag a tired practice toward cultural relevance. And we can get digital flagships that creative directors are proud to claim as part of their oeuvre.
When Websites Become Storefronts: A Conversation with Andrea Tognon
This piece ends with one last provocation, linking back directly to the title.
I made a case, hopefully, for the need to “think” before you code or design. For behaving less like a nuts-and-bolts agency and more like an architectural firm. That’s why I decided to step outside the metaphor and ask an actual architect. Someone who designs places with a genuine sense of place.
Andrea Tognon is a highly respected architect who has been crafting store designs and spatial narratives for a long list of luxury brands, including Céline, Max Mara, Bottega Veneta, and Jil Sander.
Our conversation took place in his beautiful studio—a former theatre that now looks like a brutalist cathedral that instantly made me think of Ricardo Bofill’s cement-factory-turned-workspace, only this one comes with a small family of ducks roaming the garden. The setting delivered the first lesson: spaces can both energize you and shape how you think. This is yet another reason to resist the scourge of “non-places,” both physically and online.
Tognon’s practice sits at the intersection of architecture and research. While far removed from the eCommerce space, he’s exactly the kind of person I’d love to involve in the conceptual phase of a major eCommerce redesign, sitting alongside more canonical choices.
After the conversation, one quote stayed with me because it speaks volumes about the architect’s ability to think conceptually: “When designing a chair, you never start with a chair.” Inspiration rarely takes the literal path. It could come from a crack in the pavement, or maybe a book you just read. Come to think of it, literalism, or benchmarking reduced to looking at what the closest competitors are doing, is one more issue affecting the eCommerce practice.
Tognon spoke about store design cycling through eras and archetypes. The store as a “palazzo.” The store as an apartment, or even a gallery. And lest we forget, the store that treats the product as a piece of art to be glorified, or sees itself as part of the artwork. Eventually, the store goes back to thinking of itself as a store. All the while I was thinking, “an eCommerce is an eCommerce is an eCommerce.” Very rarely do I see the initial research (if it even exists) pondering the form factor.
Tognon walked me through an excursus of fashion’s most iconic stores. I’m using the word “iconic” deliberately because the idea of an equally iconic webstore still feels pretty far‑fetched: Commes des Garçons’ Chelsea boutique, designed to be an extension of Chelsea’s gallery culture. John Pawson’s flagship for Calvin Klein, which was a monument to minimalism and a place that had people wondering, “Where are the display windows? Where are the shopping racks?” Or Prada’s Epicenter, a space porous to events, crowds, and performances.
For comparison, we pulled up a handful of luxury websites, all of which applied the same kind of non‑offensive, near‑invisible design. There were a few smart details, such as Lemaire’s gently disorienting layouts and playlists, an illustrated icon link on Loewe.com. But overall, the grid still ruled each page, acting as a neat little stand‑in for prison bars.
Tognon said one more thing that created an intellectual full-circle moment. “When I’m doing a flagship, there is almost invariably a request to do something that doesn’t exist yet. To ‘push the envelope,’ and to do a lot of research.”
There it is again: research and a willingness to experiment. This is how we depart from modest, hyper-pragmatic, and dogmatic mindsets that hinder innovation.
But both must be done with intention, because Tognon believes that a store should respond to its context, not just the brand or the space’s intent. This opens up a whole new layer to the conversation because the internet has no context. There is no Omotesando internet and Montenapoleone internet. Or maybe, we just haven’t learned how to design those “streets” yet.
Does Tognon have the ultimate formula for designing our eCommerce experiences? Of course not. Because, aside from the provocation of the title, there is no formula. You don’t make iconic work, or even moderately interesting work, by being formulaic. Each project is different, and that’s exactly how it should be.
You just need an architect’s eye, curiosity, and creativity. Only then can we create digital flagships that earn their place in consumers’ minds.
You’ve heard this lament a thousand times already: “Every eCommerce site looks the same.”
More progressive corners of the interwebs have been banging this drum for ages. (You’ve likely even read it on this site.) But we, as individuals and as an industry, have not done much to correct it.
Despite eCommerce being a mature, nearly ancient, discipline, most professionals still live and practice in fear. We still have night terrors about customers failing to spot the hamburger menu, CTAs hiding in the dark, and users getting so lost in a checkout maze that they abandon their carts completely.
Destroy all friction!
Avoid cognitive load.
Apply best practices.
Genuflect to UI conventions.
Preach by the grid.
Everything standard, please.
This is the gospel of Ecommerce Absolutism, which inevitably led us to digital non-places that swiftly convert the already converted while doing precisely nothing to convince those who still need some convincing.
That’s the missed opportunity, in square business terms: the digital flagships we have today only cater to high-intent buyers. Everyone else is better off finding motivation elsewhere.
A State of Digital Monotony
We are obviously stuck.
Ecommerce thinking occasionally reaches for the sublime (oblique Future Commerce’s flex), yet the actual practice still largely treats eCommerce as a digestive issue, a chore to be optimized, and an existing demand to be captured. Brand identity, product discovery, and serendipity — all the things that create desire — are best done elsewhere, by “other teams.”
What’s stopping eCommerce practitioners from doing better? Based on my personal experience, there are five reasons that fall within cultural, psychological, and organizational buckets.
1. Dashboard culture
“Dashboard culture” encapsulates our very contemporary obsessions with numbers, figures, and KPIs. Not as a means to an end but, rather, as a substitute for reality. KPIs become idols. They’re no longer a proxy for something bigger but, rather, the end goal.
Every decision must be data-driven or data-backed. To some, this is a way to “check our work” and validate our investments. But in my view, it’s a convenient way to chicken out of the decision-making itself.
When it comes to designing an eCommerce site, or anything really, data-backed evidence and true innovation tend to live on opposite sides of the field. You will never deviate from the norm, or effectively experiment to stray from it, if you need a robust analytics report to reassure you. Cat How recently wrote a brilliant article on this idea, and how data-backed design can actually kill new ideas before they show their potential.
2. Silos
Our industry loves to pontificate about cross-department collaboration, but eCommerce projects are typically led by eCommerce/digital teams, with marketing, creative, and image departments being “consulted,” often quite begrudgingly.
While eCommerce and digital teams ensure brand sites are built to drive conversions and boost sales, a true digital flagship is so much more than a point of sale. In actuality, it’s the most visible incarnation of the brand. It’s a communication touchpoint and a desire-building engine, not just a low-funnel converter. And yet the “low-funnel” mindset is solely in charge, with lower-funnel KPIs attached as proof.
Without a rebalancing of ownership, how can we expect any outcome different than the over-optimized template we’ve seen time and time again?
3. The content alibi
If I had a penny for every time I heard, “it’s all about content,” I would be able to match Anthropic’s pre-IPO valuation.
Thanks to this all-too-common mantra, the look and feel of websites rest upon the heavy shoulders of the content load. As a result, the interface is deliberately anesthetized so the “content” can supposedly shine. That logic quietly legitimizes the design of non-places (minimal shelving, neutral everything) on the assumption that images will do the heavy lifting. This is both an insult to design and an invitation to think small. It’s a deep failure of imagination.
With the notable exception of Zara, most eCommerce operations I know treat photography as an industrial pipeline that’s now further turbocharged by AI. Then, there’s a bit of perfunctory editorial on top, usually upcycled from campaigns or social media. If that’s your supposed “emotional engine,” it’s no surprise the experience runs light on actual feeling.
4. The tech alibi
Most eCommerce professionals consider themselves to be innovators. Which is to say that, at a philosophical level, they prize innovation. The only issue is that “innovation” is usually a byword for “tech innovation,” where platforms, apps, agentic bric-a-brac, AI wrappers, and snake-oil vendors promise to fix brands’ every pain point, from up-sells to returns.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with testing new solutions and piecing together a tech stack that can help bring your brand vision to life. But the act of selling is primarily about psychology, rituals, and narratives. Without these more intangible parts, you are left with a bloated stack, a utilitarian design, and a conversion machine that only does demand capture. Which is precisely why we’re collectively standing where we are today.
5. Lack of courage
When it comes to contrarian thinking, nodding along with the fray is easy, almost fashionable. But acting and actually doing something about the problems plaguing our industry requires some actual guts. There must be a willingness to put up a political fight and own the risk of an “experiment” not working — or at least not working instantly. It is terra incognita, and most managers don’t like it there.
You need a bit of a visionary. A Shackleton-like manager that allows for some drama: “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.” That kind of vibe.
Have I ever met somebody like that in the many companies I worked with? Yes. They usually sit at the top and, even there, represent a small minority. Did I ever meet the equivalent in the eCommerce or digital space? Not. Once.
So maybe you see where this is going….
What are the traits of an eCommerce site that doesn’t look like any other?
Things are so bleak that I honestly cannot come up with a fully realized example.
Yes, some people are having fun with eCommerce. More often, though, it’s people naïve enough to broach the topic without the extra baggage and the ingrained thinking that come from best practices and too many Shoptalks. And usually the fun is limited in size, scope, or both.
A brand may be so small it barely registers in cultural terms. Or the experiment could be confined to a special landing page that barely gets any traffic. These are exceptions to the rule, and they’re not representative of an actual, cohesive movement.
I have a special folder where I collect these little pockets of all-too-rare eCommerce dissent. Famine makes the eyes go hungry, so I will take every little morsel that comes my way.
Here is one example. An X post highlighting several skate brands' websites. Admittedly, there is a lot to like. Raw, dense, and obviously referencing early-aughts web design and SoCal skate culture, they feel more authentic and on-brand than most websites. I’m sure CRO fundamentalists will have issues with them. How punk is that!
Earlier in the year, eCommerce dissidents fell in love with Hermès’ redesign. To be fair, this was more than an actual redesign; it was one of those periodic artist takeovers that Hermès does. And for the occasion, the whole website hosted a series of illustrations by Linda Merad, shown side by side with the usual photography. As of now, the site is largely back to normal.
On one level, you could file this under “the content alibi”: dressing the windows while leaving everything else untouched. But on another level, if you squint and treat the glass as half full, you can just about see the first shoots of what I’d call Digital Craft.
Digital Craft: Artisanal Design As an Act of Rebellion
Digital Craft is one way we can make eCommerce more interesting, both visually and culturally. At the very least, it’s part of the solution.
What I like about this term is that it immediately suggests quality and refinement. I refuse to believe that the only escape from the sea of sameness is to cosplay Geocities or hide behind an anti‑design full of doodles and pixelated scraps. The distinction matters.
In my definition, Digital Craft is an act of rebellion because it refuses the shortcut of using standard parts: familiar icon sets, neutral backgrounds, fine lines, and generic layout primitives. Each part is bespoke, reflecting a single vision, a clear intention, and hours of (extra) work.
Digital Craft isn’t what Hermès did. It’s what Hermès does with its products and stores, including its windows. It’s having magical, even manic details throughout, to both signal a difference and raise a smile.
Digital Craft is backgrounds treated as textured surfaces, sound design and clever animations, narratives instead of bulk-loaded copywriting, and navigation tools paired with editorial detours. It’s on-site agents, if you must, that act like personal shoppers, not a glorified Clippy.
Perhaps at this stage, a long-overdue disclaimer is in order: this is not for everybody. Commodities and products that have no emotional connection whatsoever can do with websites to match (that is, soulless converters). No need to waste money on eccentric notions such as “eCommerce having a character.”
But brands that are targeting a passion more than a user need to step up their eCommerce game by being artisanal. By being leftfield and doing things with just as much passion. Transactions will follow, as they usually follow desire.
Will the Ecommerce People Please Take One Step Back?
Let us assume that you, reader, are in a position to effect change. In all likelihood, you sit “above” the traditional eCommerce hierarchy.
You may be asking many questions, such as "How do we make eCommerce interesting?" How do we make Digital Craft a reality? How do we overcome the five forces that keep eCommerce trapped in this sea of sameness?
Well, maybe we ditch the eCommerce people.
(Pause for effect)
Or rather, we change the way we work so that traditional eCommerce thinking isn’t the only mode of thinking. Especially not at the beginning.
Put bluntly, projects for the kinds of brands I’m talking about should not begin with the usual eCommerce cast (chief digital officers, omnichannel czars, chief experience officers, etc.). They’re essential, but later, when there’s something to engineer, operate, and optimize. At the start, you need to be thinking further upstream, higher on the conceptual ladder.
It’s a bit like building a house. You can go straight to the construction company, and they will build something decent for you. But if you are more ambitious, you need an architectural firm.
This is why we are stuck. We have been building websites by going straight to the construction firm. The reliable pragmatists. What did we get? No-nonsense places that…function.
I hate to reference the past because you end up sounding nostalgic, but Prada’s legendary “Vomit” website was conceived by OMA and 2x4, not a Shopify premium partner.
It was a concept (not even a URL one, if we want to be specific), long before it became a website. A graphic-architectural system that bled across screens, with heavily researched foundations.
Concept and Research were, and still are, the key notions here. Traditional eCommerce teams should take a step back so the process can evolve to enable them.
Digital flagships should be carefully researched and conceptualized long before they are designed, coded, and integrated. In the age of AI, with design and coding timelines compressed, one should have time to do a bit of thinking, right? And this type of thinking requires a fundamentally different skill set from that of traditional eCommerce practitioners. It’s about culture. It’s about aesthetics. It’s about strategy.
Every eCommerce project should then start with a stand-alone research and conceptualization phase that culminates in a single integrated brief. Agencies on the receiving end should then be encouraged to think holistically about culture, visuals, features, commercial goals, technological possibilities, and brand narratives. There’s some eCommerce thinking, but it’s mixed with other modes of thinking. Mix the gene pool a bit, and let some fresh air into the room.
Depending on how your brand is structured, the resulting concepts should be discussed not just with the Ecommerce Director but with the Creative Director, the Image Department, the Chief Marketing Officer, and the CEO. It should be clear from the initial brief that the flagship must be both a conversion engine and a place of cult, with neither overshadowing the other.
The actual design, the final architecture, the roadmap, and the budget scenarios come later. At that stage, the “classic” eCommerce team can take over, with just enough external control to ensure that the concept remains front and center. (And there should be zero tolerance for malicious compliance or hijacking.)
Since a digital flagship is a living organism, periodic reviews and evolutions should be scheduled, considering multiple perspectives once again, not just an A/B test proving that bigger CTAs get more clicks.
This is only a rough template, of course, but it’s one any brand can steal from. By injecting more thinking and curiosity into the process, we can drag a tired practice toward cultural relevance. And we can get digital flagships that creative directors are proud to claim as part of their oeuvre.
When Websites Become Storefronts: A Conversation with Andrea Tognon
This piece ends with one last provocation, linking back directly to the title.
I made a case, hopefully, for the need to “think” before you code or design. For behaving less like a nuts-and-bolts agency and more like an architectural firm. That’s why I decided to step outside the metaphor and ask an actual architect. Someone who designs places with a genuine sense of place.
Andrea Tognon is a highly respected architect who has been crafting store designs and spatial narratives for a long list of luxury brands, including Céline, Max Mara, Bottega Veneta, and Jil Sander.
Our conversation took place in his beautiful studio—a former theatre that now looks like a brutalist cathedral that instantly made me think of Ricardo Bofill’s cement-factory-turned-workspace, only this one comes with a small family of ducks roaming the garden. The setting delivered the first lesson: spaces can both energize you and shape how you think. This is yet another reason to resist the scourge of “non-places,” both physically and online.
Tognon’s practice sits at the intersection of architecture and research. While far removed from the eCommerce space, he’s exactly the kind of person I’d love to involve in the conceptual phase of a major eCommerce redesign, sitting alongside more canonical choices.
After the conversation, one quote stayed with me because it speaks volumes about the architect’s ability to think conceptually: “When designing a chair, you never start with a chair.” Inspiration rarely takes the literal path. It could come from a crack in the pavement, or maybe a book you just read. Come to think of it, literalism, or benchmarking reduced to looking at what the closest competitors are doing, is one more issue affecting the eCommerce practice.
Tognon spoke about store design cycling through eras and archetypes. The store as a “palazzo.” The store as an apartment, or even a gallery. And lest we forget, the store that treats the product as a piece of art to be glorified, or sees itself as part of the artwork. Eventually, the store goes back to thinking of itself as a store. All the while I was thinking, “an eCommerce is an eCommerce is an eCommerce.” Very rarely do I see the initial research (if it even exists) pondering the form factor.
Tognon walked me through an excursus of fashion’s most iconic stores. I’m using the word “iconic” deliberately because the idea of an equally iconic webstore still feels pretty far‑fetched: Commes des Garçons’ Chelsea boutique, designed to be an extension of Chelsea’s gallery culture. John Pawson’s flagship for Calvin Klein, which was a monument to minimalism and a place that had people wondering, “Where are the display windows? Where are the shopping racks?” Or Prada’s Epicenter, a space porous to events, crowds, and performances.
For comparison, we pulled up a handful of luxury websites, all of which applied the same kind of non‑offensive, near‑invisible design. There were a few smart details, such as Lemaire’s gently disorienting layouts and playlists, an illustrated icon link on Loewe.com. But overall, the grid still ruled each page, acting as a neat little stand‑in for prison bars.
Tognon said one more thing that created an intellectual full-circle moment. “When I’m doing a flagship, there is almost invariably a request to do something that doesn’t exist yet. To ‘push the envelope,’ and to do a lot of research.”
There it is again: research and a willingness to experiment. This is how we depart from modest, hyper-pragmatic, and dogmatic mindsets that hinder innovation.
But both must be done with intention, because Tognon believes that a store should respond to its context, not just the brand or the space’s intent. This opens up a whole new layer to the conversation because the internet has no context. There is no Omotesando internet and Montenapoleone internet. Or maybe, we just haven’t learned how to design those “streets” yet.
Does Tognon have the ultimate formula for designing our eCommerce experiences? Of course not. Because, aside from the provocation of the title, there is no formula. You don’t make iconic work, or even moderately interesting work, by being formulaic. Each project is different, and that’s exactly how it should be.
You just need an architect’s eye, curiosity, and creativity. Only then can we create digital flagships that earn their place in consumers’ minds.
You’ve heard this lament a thousand times already: “Every eCommerce site looks the same.”
More progressive corners of the interwebs have been banging this drum for ages. (You’ve likely even read it on this site.) But we, as individuals and as an industry, have not done much to correct it.
Despite eCommerce being a mature, nearly ancient, discipline, most professionals still live and practice in fear. We still have night terrors about customers failing to spot the hamburger menu, CTAs hiding in the dark, and users getting so lost in a checkout maze that they abandon their carts completely.
Destroy all friction!
Avoid cognitive load.
Apply best practices.
Genuflect to UI conventions.
Preach by the grid.
Everything standard, please.
This is the gospel of Ecommerce Absolutism, which inevitably led us to digital non-places that swiftly convert the already converted while doing precisely nothing to convince those who still need some convincing.
That’s the missed opportunity, in square business terms: the digital flagships we have today only cater to high-intent buyers. Everyone else is better off finding motivation elsewhere.
A State of Digital Monotony
We are obviously stuck.
Ecommerce thinking occasionally reaches for the sublime (oblique Future Commerce’s flex), yet the actual practice still largely treats eCommerce as a digestive issue, a chore to be optimized, and an existing demand to be captured. Brand identity, product discovery, and serendipity — all the things that create desire — are best done elsewhere, by “other teams.”
What’s stopping eCommerce practitioners from doing better? Based on my personal experience, there are five reasons that fall within cultural, psychological, and organizational buckets.
1. Dashboard culture
“Dashboard culture” encapsulates our very contemporary obsessions with numbers, figures, and KPIs. Not as a means to an end but, rather, as a substitute for reality. KPIs become idols. They’re no longer a proxy for something bigger but, rather, the end goal.
Every decision must be data-driven or data-backed. To some, this is a way to “check our work” and validate our investments. But in my view, it’s a convenient way to chicken out of the decision-making itself.
When it comes to designing an eCommerce site, or anything really, data-backed evidence and true innovation tend to live on opposite sides of the field. You will never deviate from the norm, or effectively experiment to stray from it, if you need a robust analytics report to reassure you. Cat How recently wrote a brilliant article on this idea, and how data-backed design can actually kill new ideas before they show their potential.
2. Silos
Our industry loves to pontificate about cross-department collaboration, but eCommerce projects are typically led by eCommerce/digital teams, with marketing, creative, and image departments being “consulted,” often quite begrudgingly.
While eCommerce and digital teams ensure brand sites are built to drive conversions and boost sales, a true digital flagship is so much more than a point of sale. In actuality, it’s the most visible incarnation of the brand. It’s a communication touchpoint and a desire-building engine, not just a low-funnel converter. And yet the “low-funnel” mindset is solely in charge, with lower-funnel KPIs attached as proof.
Without a rebalancing of ownership, how can we expect any outcome different than the over-optimized template we’ve seen time and time again?
3. The content alibi
If I had a penny for every time I heard, “it’s all about content,” I would be able to match Anthropic’s pre-IPO valuation.
Thanks to this all-too-common mantra, the look and feel of websites rest upon the heavy shoulders of the content load. As a result, the interface is deliberately anesthetized so the “content” can supposedly shine. That logic quietly legitimizes the design of non-places (minimal shelving, neutral everything) on the assumption that images will do the heavy lifting. This is both an insult to design and an invitation to think small. It’s a deep failure of imagination.
With the notable exception of Zara, most eCommerce operations I know treat photography as an industrial pipeline that’s now further turbocharged by AI. Then, there’s a bit of perfunctory editorial on top, usually upcycled from campaigns or social media. If that’s your supposed “emotional engine,” it’s no surprise the experience runs light on actual feeling.
4. The tech alibi
Most eCommerce professionals consider themselves to be innovators. Which is to say that, at a philosophical level, they prize innovation. The only issue is that “innovation” is usually a byword for “tech innovation,” where platforms, apps, agentic bric-a-brac, AI wrappers, and snake-oil vendors promise to fix brands’ every pain point, from up-sells to returns.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with testing new solutions and piecing together a tech stack that can help bring your brand vision to life. But the act of selling is primarily about psychology, rituals, and narratives. Without these more intangible parts, you are left with a bloated stack, a utilitarian design, and a conversion machine that only does demand capture. Which is precisely why we’re collectively standing where we are today.
5. Lack of courage
When it comes to contrarian thinking, nodding along with the fray is easy, almost fashionable. But acting and actually doing something about the problems plaguing our industry requires some actual guts. There must be a willingness to put up a political fight and own the risk of an “experiment” not working — or at least not working instantly. It is terra incognita, and most managers don’t like it there.
You need a bit of a visionary. A Shackleton-like manager that allows for some drama: “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.” That kind of vibe.
Have I ever met somebody like that in the many companies I worked with? Yes. They usually sit at the top and, even there, represent a small minority. Did I ever meet the equivalent in the eCommerce or digital space? Not. Once.
So maybe you see where this is going….
What are the traits of an eCommerce site that doesn’t look like any other?
Things are so bleak that I honestly cannot come up with a fully realized example.
Yes, some people are having fun with eCommerce. More often, though, it’s people naïve enough to broach the topic without the extra baggage and the ingrained thinking that come from best practices and too many Shoptalks. And usually the fun is limited in size, scope, or both.
A brand may be so small it barely registers in cultural terms. Or the experiment could be confined to a special landing page that barely gets any traffic. These are exceptions to the rule, and they’re not representative of an actual, cohesive movement.
I have a special folder where I collect these little pockets of all-too-rare eCommerce dissent. Famine makes the eyes go hungry, so I will take every little morsel that comes my way.
Here is one example. An X post highlighting several skate brands' websites. Admittedly, there is a lot to like. Raw, dense, and obviously referencing early-aughts web design and SoCal skate culture, they feel more authentic and on-brand than most websites. I’m sure CRO fundamentalists will have issues with them. How punk is that!
Earlier in the year, eCommerce dissidents fell in love with Hermès’ redesign. To be fair, this was more than an actual redesign; it was one of those periodic artist takeovers that Hermès does. And for the occasion, the whole website hosted a series of illustrations by Linda Merad, shown side by side with the usual photography. As of now, the site is largely back to normal.
On one level, you could file this under “the content alibi”: dressing the windows while leaving everything else untouched. But on another level, if you squint and treat the glass as half full, you can just about see the first shoots of what I’d call Digital Craft.
Digital Craft: Artisanal Design As an Act of Rebellion
Digital Craft is one way we can make eCommerce more interesting, both visually and culturally. At the very least, it’s part of the solution.
What I like about this term is that it immediately suggests quality and refinement. I refuse to believe that the only escape from the sea of sameness is to cosplay Geocities or hide behind an anti‑design full of doodles and pixelated scraps. The distinction matters.
In my definition, Digital Craft is an act of rebellion because it refuses the shortcut of using standard parts: familiar icon sets, neutral backgrounds, fine lines, and generic layout primitives. Each part is bespoke, reflecting a single vision, a clear intention, and hours of (extra) work.
Digital Craft isn’t what Hermès did. It’s what Hermès does with its products and stores, including its windows. It’s having magical, even manic details throughout, to both signal a difference and raise a smile.
Digital Craft is backgrounds treated as textured surfaces, sound design and clever animations, narratives instead of bulk-loaded copywriting, and navigation tools paired with editorial detours. It’s on-site agents, if you must, that act like personal shoppers, not a glorified Clippy.
Perhaps at this stage, a long-overdue disclaimer is in order: this is not for everybody. Commodities and products that have no emotional connection whatsoever can do with websites to match (that is, soulless converters). No need to waste money on eccentric notions such as “eCommerce having a character.”
But brands that are targeting a passion more than a user need to step up their eCommerce game by being artisanal. By being leftfield and doing things with just as much passion. Transactions will follow, as they usually follow desire.
Will the Ecommerce People Please Take One Step Back?
Let us assume that you, reader, are in a position to effect change. In all likelihood, you sit “above” the traditional eCommerce hierarchy.
You may be asking many questions, such as "How do we make eCommerce interesting?" How do we make Digital Craft a reality? How do we overcome the five forces that keep eCommerce trapped in this sea of sameness?
Well, maybe we ditch the eCommerce people.
(Pause for effect)
Or rather, we change the way we work so that traditional eCommerce thinking isn’t the only mode of thinking. Especially not at the beginning.
Put bluntly, projects for the kinds of brands I’m talking about should not begin with the usual eCommerce cast (chief digital officers, omnichannel czars, chief experience officers, etc.). They’re essential, but later, when there’s something to engineer, operate, and optimize. At the start, you need to be thinking further upstream, higher on the conceptual ladder.
It’s a bit like building a house. You can go straight to the construction company, and they will build something decent for you. But if you are more ambitious, you need an architectural firm.
This is why we are stuck. We have been building websites by going straight to the construction firm. The reliable pragmatists. What did we get? No-nonsense places that…function.
I hate to reference the past because you end up sounding nostalgic, but Prada’s legendary “Vomit” website was conceived by OMA and 2x4, not a Shopify premium partner.
It was a concept (not even a URL one, if we want to be specific), long before it became a website. A graphic-architectural system that bled across screens, with heavily researched foundations.
Concept and Research were, and still are, the key notions here. Traditional eCommerce teams should take a step back so the process can evolve to enable them.
Digital flagships should be carefully researched and conceptualized long before they are designed, coded, and integrated. In the age of AI, with design and coding timelines compressed, one should have time to do a bit of thinking, right? And this type of thinking requires a fundamentally different skill set from that of traditional eCommerce practitioners. It’s about culture. It’s about aesthetics. It’s about strategy.
Every eCommerce project should then start with a stand-alone research and conceptualization phase that culminates in a single integrated brief. Agencies on the receiving end should then be encouraged to think holistically about culture, visuals, features, commercial goals, technological possibilities, and brand narratives. There’s some eCommerce thinking, but it’s mixed with other modes of thinking. Mix the gene pool a bit, and let some fresh air into the room.
Depending on how your brand is structured, the resulting concepts should be discussed not just with the Ecommerce Director but with the Creative Director, the Image Department, the Chief Marketing Officer, and the CEO. It should be clear from the initial brief that the flagship must be both a conversion engine and a place of cult, with neither overshadowing the other.
The actual design, the final architecture, the roadmap, and the budget scenarios come later. At that stage, the “classic” eCommerce team can take over, with just enough external control to ensure that the concept remains front and center. (And there should be zero tolerance for malicious compliance or hijacking.)
Since a digital flagship is a living organism, periodic reviews and evolutions should be scheduled, considering multiple perspectives once again, not just an A/B test proving that bigger CTAs get more clicks.
This is only a rough template, of course, but it’s one any brand can steal from. By injecting more thinking and curiosity into the process, we can drag a tired practice toward cultural relevance. And we can get digital flagships that creative directors are proud to claim as part of their oeuvre.
When Websites Become Storefronts: A Conversation with Andrea Tognon
This piece ends with one last provocation, linking back directly to the title.
I made a case, hopefully, for the need to “think” before you code or design. For behaving less like a nuts-and-bolts agency and more like an architectural firm. That’s why I decided to step outside the metaphor and ask an actual architect. Someone who designs places with a genuine sense of place.
Andrea Tognon is a highly respected architect who has been crafting store designs and spatial narratives for a long list of luxury brands, including Céline, Max Mara, Bottega Veneta, and Jil Sander.
Our conversation took place in his beautiful studio—a former theatre that now looks like a brutalist cathedral that instantly made me think of Ricardo Bofill’s cement-factory-turned-workspace, only this one comes with a small family of ducks roaming the garden. The setting delivered the first lesson: spaces can both energize you and shape how you think. This is yet another reason to resist the scourge of “non-places,” both physically and online.
Tognon’s practice sits at the intersection of architecture and research. While far removed from the eCommerce space, he’s exactly the kind of person I’d love to involve in the conceptual phase of a major eCommerce redesign, sitting alongside more canonical choices.
After the conversation, one quote stayed with me because it speaks volumes about the architect’s ability to think conceptually: “When designing a chair, you never start with a chair.” Inspiration rarely takes the literal path. It could come from a crack in the pavement, or maybe a book you just read. Come to think of it, literalism, or benchmarking reduced to looking at what the closest competitors are doing, is one more issue affecting the eCommerce practice.
Tognon spoke about store design cycling through eras and archetypes. The store as a “palazzo.” The store as an apartment, or even a gallery. And lest we forget, the store that treats the product as a piece of art to be glorified, or sees itself as part of the artwork. Eventually, the store goes back to thinking of itself as a store. All the while I was thinking, “an eCommerce is an eCommerce is an eCommerce.” Very rarely do I see the initial research (if it even exists) pondering the form factor.
Tognon walked me through an excursus of fashion’s most iconic stores. I’m using the word “iconic” deliberately because the idea of an equally iconic webstore still feels pretty far‑fetched: Commes des Garçons’ Chelsea boutique, designed to be an extension of Chelsea’s gallery culture. John Pawson’s flagship for Calvin Klein, which was a monument to minimalism and a place that had people wondering, “Where are the display windows? Where are the shopping racks?” Or Prada’s Epicenter, a space porous to events, crowds, and performances.
For comparison, we pulled up a handful of luxury websites, all of which applied the same kind of non‑offensive, near‑invisible design. There were a few smart details, such as Lemaire’s gently disorienting layouts and playlists, an illustrated icon link on Loewe.com. But overall, the grid still ruled each page, acting as a neat little stand‑in for prison bars.
Tognon said one more thing that created an intellectual full-circle moment. “When I’m doing a flagship, there is almost invariably a request to do something that doesn’t exist yet. To ‘push the envelope,’ and to do a lot of research.”
There it is again: research and a willingness to experiment. This is how we depart from modest, hyper-pragmatic, and dogmatic mindsets that hinder innovation.
But both must be done with intention, because Tognon believes that a store should respond to its context, not just the brand or the space’s intent. This opens up a whole new layer to the conversation because the internet has no context. There is no Omotesando internet and Montenapoleone internet. Or maybe, we just haven’t learned how to design those “streets” yet.
Does Tognon have the ultimate formula for designing our eCommerce experiences? Of course not. Because, aside from the provocation of the title, there is no formula. You don’t make iconic work, or even moderately interesting work, by being formulaic. Each project is different, and that’s exactly how it should be.
You just need an architect’s eye, curiosity, and creativity. Only then can we create digital flagships that earn their place in consumers’ minds.
You’ve heard this lament a thousand times already: “Every eCommerce site looks the same.”
More progressive corners of the interwebs have been banging this drum for ages. (You’ve likely even read it on this site.) But we, as individuals and as an industry, have not done much to correct it.
Despite eCommerce being a mature, nearly ancient, discipline, most professionals still live and practice in fear. We still have night terrors about customers failing to spot the hamburger menu, CTAs hiding in the dark, and users getting so lost in a checkout maze that they abandon their carts completely.
Destroy all friction!
Avoid cognitive load.
Apply best practices.
Genuflect to UI conventions.
Preach by the grid.
Everything standard, please.
This is the gospel of Ecommerce Absolutism, which inevitably led us to digital non-places that swiftly convert the already converted while doing precisely nothing to convince those who still need some convincing.
That’s the missed opportunity, in square business terms: the digital flagships we have today only cater to high-intent buyers. Everyone else is better off finding motivation elsewhere.
A State of Digital Monotony
We are obviously stuck.
Ecommerce thinking occasionally reaches for the sublime (oblique Future Commerce’s flex), yet the actual practice still largely treats eCommerce as a digestive issue, a chore to be optimized, and an existing demand to be captured. Brand identity, product discovery, and serendipity — all the things that create desire — are best done elsewhere, by “other teams.”
What’s stopping eCommerce practitioners from doing better? Based on my personal experience, there are five reasons that fall within cultural, psychological, and organizational buckets.
1. Dashboard culture
“Dashboard culture” encapsulates our very contemporary obsessions with numbers, figures, and KPIs. Not as a means to an end but, rather, as a substitute for reality. KPIs become idols. They’re no longer a proxy for something bigger but, rather, the end goal.
Every decision must be data-driven or data-backed. To some, this is a way to “check our work” and validate our investments. But in my view, it’s a convenient way to chicken out of the decision-making itself.
When it comes to designing an eCommerce site, or anything really, data-backed evidence and true innovation tend to live on opposite sides of the field. You will never deviate from the norm, or effectively experiment to stray from it, if you need a robust analytics report to reassure you. Cat How recently wrote a brilliant article on this idea, and how data-backed design can actually kill new ideas before they show their potential.
2. Silos
Our industry loves to pontificate about cross-department collaboration, but eCommerce projects are typically led by eCommerce/digital teams, with marketing, creative, and image departments being “consulted,” often quite begrudgingly.
While eCommerce and digital teams ensure brand sites are built to drive conversions and boost sales, a true digital flagship is so much more than a point of sale. In actuality, it’s the most visible incarnation of the brand. It’s a communication touchpoint and a desire-building engine, not just a low-funnel converter. And yet the “low-funnel” mindset is solely in charge, with lower-funnel KPIs attached as proof.
Without a rebalancing of ownership, how can we expect any outcome different than the over-optimized template we’ve seen time and time again?
3. The content alibi
If I had a penny for every time I heard, “it’s all about content,” I would be able to match Anthropic’s pre-IPO valuation.
Thanks to this all-too-common mantra, the look and feel of websites rest upon the heavy shoulders of the content load. As a result, the interface is deliberately anesthetized so the “content” can supposedly shine. That logic quietly legitimizes the design of non-places (minimal shelving, neutral everything) on the assumption that images will do the heavy lifting. This is both an insult to design and an invitation to think small. It’s a deep failure of imagination.
With the notable exception of Zara, most eCommerce operations I know treat photography as an industrial pipeline that’s now further turbocharged by AI. Then, there’s a bit of perfunctory editorial on top, usually upcycled from campaigns or social media. If that’s your supposed “emotional engine,” it’s no surprise the experience runs light on actual feeling.
4. The tech alibi
Most eCommerce professionals consider themselves to be innovators. Which is to say that, at a philosophical level, they prize innovation. The only issue is that “innovation” is usually a byword for “tech innovation,” where platforms, apps, agentic bric-a-brac, AI wrappers, and snake-oil vendors promise to fix brands’ every pain point, from up-sells to returns.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with testing new solutions and piecing together a tech stack that can help bring your brand vision to life. But the act of selling is primarily about psychology, rituals, and narratives. Without these more intangible parts, you are left with a bloated stack, a utilitarian design, and a conversion machine that only does demand capture. Which is precisely why we’re collectively standing where we are today.
5. Lack of courage
When it comes to contrarian thinking, nodding along with the fray is easy, almost fashionable. But acting and actually doing something about the problems plaguing our industry requires some actual guts. There must be a willingness to put up a political fight and own the risk of an “experiment” not working — or at least not working instantly. It is terra incognita, and most managers don’t like it there.
You need a bit of a visionary. A Shackleton-like manager that allows for some drama: “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.” That kind of vibe.
Have I ever met somebody like that in the many companies I worked with? Yes. They usually sit at the top and, even there, represent a small minority. Did I ever meet the equivalent in the eCommerce or digital space? Not. Once.
So maybe you see where this is going….
What are the traits of an eCommerce site that doesn’t look like any other?
Things are so bleak that I honestly cannot come up with a fully realized example.
Yes, some people are having fun with eCommerce. More often, though, it’s people naïve enough to broach the topic without the extra baggage and the ingrained thinking that come from best practices and too many Shoptalks. And usually the fun is limited in size, scope, or both.
A brand may be so small it barely registers in cultural terms. Or the experiment could be confined to a special landing page that barely gets any traffic. These are exceptions to the rule, and they’re not representative of an actual, cohesive movement.
I have a special folder where I collect these little pockets of all-too-rare eCommerce dissent. Famine makes the eyes go hungry, so I will take every little morsel that comes my way.
Here is one example. An X post highlighting several skate brands' websites. Admittedly, there is a lot to like. Raw, dense, and obviously referencing early-aughts web design and SoCal skate culture, they feel more authentic and on-brand than most websites. I’m sure CRO fundamentalists will have issues with them. How punk is that!
Earlier in the year, eCommerce dissidents fell in love with Hermès’ redesign. To be fair, this was more than an actual redesign; it was one of those periodic artist takeovers that Hermès does. And for the occasion, the whole website hosted a series of illustrations by Linda Merad, shown side by side with the usual photography. As of now, the site is largely back to normal.
On one level, you could file this under “the content alibi”: dressing the windows while leaving everything else untouched. But on another level, if you squint and treat the glass as half full, you can just about see the first shoots of what I’d call Digital Craft.
Digital Craft: Artisanal Design As an Act of Rebellion
Digital Craft is one way we can make eCommerce more interesting, both visually and culturally. At the very least, it’s part of the solution.
What I like about this term is that it immediately suggests quality and refinement. I refuse to believe that the only escape from the sea of sameness is to cosplay Geocities or hide behind an anti‑design full of doodles and pixelated scraps. The distinction matters.
In my definition, Digital Craft is an act of rebellion because it refuses the shortcut of using standard parts: familiar icon sets, neutral backgrounds, fine lines, and generic layout primitives. Each part is bespoke, reflecting a single vision, a clear intention, and hours of (extra) work.
Digital Craft isn’t what Hermès did. It’s what Hermès does with its products and stores, including its windows. It’s having magical, even manic details throughout, to both signal a difference and raise a smile.
Digital Craft is backgrounds treated as textured surfaces, sound design and clever animations, narratives instead of bulk-loaded copywriting, and navigation tools paired with editorial detours. It’s on-site agents, if you must, that act like personal shoppers, not a glorified Clippy.
Perhaps at this stage, a long-overdue disclaimer is in order: this is not for everybody. Commodities and products that have no emotional connection whatsoever can do with websites to match (that is, soulless converters). No need to waste money on eccentric notions such as “eCommerce having a character.”
But brands that are targeting a passion more than a user need to step up their eCommerce game by being artisanal. By being leftfield and doing things with just as much passion. Transactions will follow, as they usually follow desire.
Will the Ecommerce People Please Take One Step Back?
Let us assume that you, reader, are in a position to effect change. In all likelihood, you sit “above” the traditional eCommerce hierarchy.
You may be asking many questions, such as "How do we make eCommerce interesting?" How do we make Digital Craft a reality? How do we overcome the five forces that keep eCommerce trapped in this sea of sameness?
Well, maybe we ditch the eCommerce people.
(Pause for effect)
Or rather, we change the way we work so that traditional eCommerce thinking isn’t the only mode of thinking. Especially not at the beginning.
Put bluntly, projects for the kinds of brands I’m talking about should not begin with the usual eCommerce cast (chief digital officers, omnichannel czars, chief experience officers, etc.). They’re essential, but later, when there’s something to engineer, operate, and optimize. At the start, you need to be thinking further upstream, higher on the conceptual ladder.
It’s a bit like building a house. You can go straight to the construction company, and they will build something decent for you. But if you are more ambitious, you need an architectural firm.
This is why we are stuck. We have been building websites by going straight to the construction firm. The reliable pragmatists. What did we get? No-nonsense places that…function.
I hate to reference the past because you end up sounding nostalgic, but Prada’s legendary “Vomit” website was conceived by OMA and 2x4, not a Shopify premium partner.
It was a concept (not even a URL one, if we want to be specific), long before it became a website. A graphic-architectural system that bled across screens, with heavily researched foundations.
Concept and Research were, and still are, the key notions here. Traditional eCommerce teams should take a step back so the process can evolve to enable them.
Digital flagships should be carefully researched and conceptualized long before they are designed, coded, and integrated. In the age of AI, with design and coding timelines compressed, one should have time to do a bit of thinking, right? And this type of thinking requires a fundamentally different skill set from that of traditional eCommerce practitioners. It’s about culture. It’s about aesthetics. It’s about strategy.
Every eCommerce project should then start with a stand-alone research and conceptualization phase that culminates in a single integrated brief. Agencies on the receiving end should then be encouraged to think holistically about culture, visuals, features, commercial goals, technological possibilities, and brand narratives. There’s some eCommerce thinking, but it’s mixed with other modes of thinking. Mix the gene pool a bit, and let some fresh air into the room.
Depending on how your brand is structured, the resulting concepts should be discussed not just with the Ecommerce Director but with the Creative Director, the Image Department, the Chief Marketing Officer, and the CEO. It should be clear from the initial brief that the flagship must be both a conversion engine and a place of cult, with neither overshadowing the other.
The actual design, the final architecture, the roadmap, and the budget scenarios come later. At that stage, the “classic” eCommerce team can take over, with just enough external control to ensure that the concept remains front and center. (And there should be zero tolerance for malicious compliance or hijacking.)
Since a digital flagship is a living organism, periodic reviews and evolutions should be scheduled, considering multiple perspectives once again, not just an A/B test proving that bigger CTAs get more clicks.
This is only a rough template, of course, but it’s one any brand can steal from. By injecting more thinking and curiosity into the process, we can drag a tired practice toward cultural relevance. And we can get digital flagships that creative directors are proud to claim as part of their oeuvre.
When Websites Become Storefronts: A Conversation with Andrea Tognon
This piece ends with one last provocation, linking back directly to the title.
I made a case, hopefully, for the need to “think” before you code or design. For behaving less like a nuts-and-bolts agency and more like an architectural firm. That’s why I decided to step outside the metaphor and ask an actual architect. Someone who designs places with a genuine sense of place.
Andrea Tognon is a highly respected architect who has been crafting store designs and spatial narratives for a long list of luxury brands, including Céline, Max Mara, Bottega Veneta, and Jil Sander.
Our conversation took place in his beautiful studio—a former theatre that now looks like a brutalist cathedral that instantly made me think of Ricardo Bofill’s cement-factory-turned-workspace, only this one comes with a small family of ducks roaming the garden. The setting delivered the first lesson: spaces can both energize you and shape how you think. This is yet another reason to resist the scourge of “non-places,” both physically and online.
Tognon’s practice sits at the intersection of architecture and research. While far removed from the eCommerce space, he’s exactly the kind of person I’d love to involve in the conceptual phase of a major eCommerce redesign, sitting alongside more canonical choices.
After the conversation, one quote stayed with me because it speaks volumes about the architect’s ability to think conceptually: “When designing a chair, you never start with a chair.” Inspiration rarely takes the literal path. It could come from a crack in the pavement, or maybe a book you just read. Come to think of it, literalism, or benchmarking reduced to looking at what the closest competitors are doing, is one more issue affecting the eCommerce practice.
Tognon spoke about store design cycling through eras and archetypes. The store as a “palazzo.” The store as an apartment, or even a gallery. And lest we forget, the store that treats the product as a piece of art to be glorified, or sees itself as part of the artwork. Eventually, the store goes back to thinking of itself as a store. All the while I was thinking, “an eCommerce is an eCommerce is an eCommerce.” Very rarely do I see the initial research (if it even exists) pondering the form factor.
Tognon walked me through an excursus of fashion’s most iconic stores. I’m using the word “iconic” deliberately because the idea of an equally iconic webstore still feels pretty far‑fetched: Commes des Garçons’ Chelsea boutique, designed to be an extension of Chelsea’s gallery culture. John Pawson’s flagship for Calvin Klein, which was a monument to minimalism and a place that had people wondering, “Where are the display windows? Where are the shopping racks?” Or Prada’s Epicenter, a space porous to events, crowds, and performances.
For comparison, we pulled up a handful of luxury websites, all of which applied the same kind of non‑offensive, near‑invisible design. There were a few smart details, such as Lemaire’s gently disorienting layouts and playlists, an illustrated icon link on Loewe.com. But overall, the grid still ruled each page, acting as a neat little stand‑in for prison bars.
Tognon said one more thing that created an intellectual full-circle moment. “When I’m doing a flagship, there is almost invariably a request to do something that doesn’t exist yet. To ‘push the envelope,’ and to do a lot of research.”
There it is again: research and a willingness to experiment. This is how we depart from modest, hyper-pragmatic, and dogmatic mindsets that hinder innovation.
But both must be done with intention, because Tognon believes that a store should respond to its context, not just the brand or the space’s intent. This opens up a whole new layer to the conversation because the internet has no context. There is no Omotesando internet and Montenapoleone internet. Or maybe, we just haven’t learned how to design those “streets” yet.
Does Tognon have the ultimate formula for designing our eCommerce experiences? Of course not. Because, aside from the provocation of the title, there is no formula. You don’t make iconic work, or even moderately interesting work, by being formulaic. Each project is different, and that’s exactly how it should be.
You just need an architect’s eye, curiosity, and creativity. Only then can we create digital flagships that earn their place in consumers’ minds.
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