2025-26 Denver Nuggets Case Study

Reimagining the Denver Nuggets brand identity for the 2025-26 season — a look & feel built for champions. My third season with the Nuggets, crafting a design system as bold and unstoppable as the team itself.
To re-imagine a look & feel, I had to dissect and reflect on last years. First, I cam up with stong, key themes that were prominent. The bold header, rectangle motif, sticker element, two fonts, and the full scale player imagery overlay on the header were all dominant aspects that made the look simple, clean and focused.
What worked last year? First, it was the consistency that really brought the creative to life. This look was very simple so it was easy to stray away from it but being a disciplined designer, remaining consistent really elevated it and made it stay on brand. Second, the simple look created the opportunity for multiple color versions which was nice when it came to creating different campaigns and making them different but with the same toolkit elements. Lastly, because it was so clean and simple, it made it easily adaptable for cross-team collaboration. From digital and social to in-arena and game presentation, this simple look became very effective. But, there were also some problems I identified throughout the season and upon my reflection. Things got boring, even with the color variations. Too much of the same things for 82 games gets old... fast. Also, it was hard to be creative with the constraints of the trimmed down toolkit. There were not enough assets for the creative teams to really make campaigns flourish and for game presentation and video teams to create awesome motion and atmosphere on the screens and in the arena. It was a challenge to hear things like "we want it to pop" from marketing when talking about certain creative because this look was not designed to encompass that feeling.
Gearing up for the 2025-26 direction. As the offseason got underway with trades and training, marketing reflected on the success and failures of the 2024-25 season. The front office began to shape the teams future identity during the playoffs giving off new hope of a return to championship pedigree. As creatives in sports marketing, it is our jobs to bring the story of each team, every season, to life. Last year, the team was focused on returning to glory. One season removed from our first championship. The creative was designed to show the teams focus and sharpness on one goal, a championship. But, the Nuggets came up short to the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game Seven of the Second Round, destroying the goal. But then the front office did something that has not happened in some time, they quickly worked on a new face and new identity. Trading away Michael Porter Jr. and naming a new coach, GM and president of operations, things quickly started to change. A lot remained the same, but a lot did change after that devastating loss. And so did the narrative around the Denver Nuggets. A dream for creatives and marketing departments. This is where an idea was born. Instead of completely changing course and creating a whole new look, let's mirror the team. Let's re-imagine the look from last year in the same way the team changed this offseason.
"How can we make this better?" In what ways can we mirror what we designed last year but elevate it, in the same way the team just did with their roster. It is with no doubts, the Denver Nuggets got extremely dangerous this offseason with the good players they brought in. How can we channel that storyline into the look and feel for the upcoming 2025-26 season?
In comes the creative brief. Marketing really loved the clean simple look from last year and thought it was a good use of brand colors and clean lines. They put notes on their mood board like “stick with the same concept, just elevate it” and “include other design elements that can be added, mixed and matched.” They also wanted to incorporate a third font into the toolkit. The hard part is knowing how far to push things when things are being re-imagined as a designer. With all of this in mind, I got to work along with two other designers who were also getting the same creative brief to submit three different proposals. I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Let’s go make this happen.
On day one after a few minutes of staring at the creative brief and carrying ideas from last season, I knew exactly what I wanted to do… Rule number one: Break the rules! I thought the creative brief was a little open ended and didn’t really offer much direction other that elevating the past designs so I wanted to see how far I could push my designs in a new direction with still paying respects and incorporating key themes from last year. I wanted my proposal to elicit the fun aspects of sports, being a fan and looking up to these athletes as superheroes. At the end of the day, that is what they are. I work with them, and they are still heroes to me. I also wanted to encompass the individuality behind these players and showcase their emotions and passion for the game. Wit that in mind, I designed my first drafts in one day.
Sometimes as designers we have the luxury to sketch and work on many roughs before design execution. This is what we were taught in school and how things normally go. But, in the sports and entertainment industry, things are needed fast to being the extensive work of campaigning. A few days after the Nuggets lost in the 2025 playoffs, internal teams were already requesting graphics and campaigns in the new look and feel. That is how things go. My college professor would hate me for this, but I have gotten really good at coming up with concepts really fast and delivering strong first drafts. I learned this about myself as a designer and art director last year, when my proposals for the 2024-25 Colorado Avalanche were selected as the official look and feel. In order to challenge the status quo of marketing and the loose creative brief, I knew I needed to push my designs further than the other two proposals. Being the designer who implemented and brought the look and feel to life last season, I knew it needed to be more creative. I also knew that the social team and the in-game team were hungry to be more creative and have more assets to work with. From the mood board visuals, I gravitated towards the grit and colorful aspects that were shown as examples. I then kept the ideas rolling. Bringing over the rectangle motif and the strong brand colors from last year, I re-imagined the look with bigger rectangles and multiple player images. I added a grid overlay on gradient backgrounds that were editing to be grainy. I created a lot of dimension with having things break the boundaries of the large rectangle and my design started to look like a comic book or scrap book. I really love how these first drafts shaped up to be and looking back at them knowing they were designed in a days work, I am extremely proud of them. I remember when we were turned them in, I surprised the group and was told numerous times, these could be looks right now. That was a very proud moment and to my college professors, I have learned to sketch in my mind and turn them into real designs fast. You would be proud too.
After the internal critique, now was the time to deliver the final proposal to marketing and the rest of the organization. There was a ton of great feedback in that meeting. I like to throw as many assets as I can into my first drafts to see which ones stick and which don’t. The social media team and the in-game/video production team really love me for this. Both parties get their ways. Marketing gets to trim up the designs and the creatives are left with the remaining assets to work with. I love this in my design work because the designers get freedom. They don’t get stuck with minimal assets and design elements. No, they get a well-rounded repository of assets that they get to work with. It is a creatives dream, and I always bring that into my art direction.
The meeting ended with a great deal of support for my proposal. I ended up going back-to-back on creative look and feels. Last year with the Avalanche, and now with the revamped Denver Nuggets. There were some small changes like getting rid of certain assets like the film strip, three-dimensional grid inside the rectangle and the removal of the lens flare. But those were anticipated, and once stripped away the look still had a lot of assets to work with. There was a little hesitation about this look working without the assets so when building the toolkit, I stripped away a lot of the vector elements, to show that this look can still be clean and focused like last year, but it can also be fun and energetic. There are over 60 different assets that designers and creators can use this season and I know that everyone is going to have a ton of fun creating. That was my main goal. I am very pleased with how last years look was re-imagined and I cannot wait to see if take form this season.
This page shows some of the assets that can be used this year in the official toolkit. I even created a how-to on the comic vector elements file, on how to create your own comic asset. This idea came as I was designing. I thought it would applicable to the social and game presentation teams to use throughout the season on a case-by-case basis. One night, Nikola Jokic might have 50 points, 30 rebounds, and 20 assists. It would be cool to incorporate that within the hand-drawn element of this look and feel.
With multiple different tape options to choose from in both navy and burgundy colors to the multitude of different flag vector options, this look will never run out of creative options. There are vector specific Denver Nuggets elements and jersey name tags and numbers to choose from. I am especially proud of the jersey elements because instead of having the designers clip out jerseys throughout the season, I went ahead and cut out each players name and number for all four jerseys the Nuggets will wear this season and put them in the toolkit. This saves so much time but it also creates consistency as there won’t be any deviation away from these official approved jersey cut outs in the repository.
Thank you so much for reading this case study. Leading the Art Direction for the Denver Nuggets 2025-26 season was such an awesome experience. I truly hope you see the re-imagined look and feel and have energetic emotions when seeing the designs. Now, the hard-work of implementing this over the course of an 82 game season beings! Stay tuned as I upload more graphics throughout this season.
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