Every design system has a name. Ours is called Deco-Hose.
The name comes from two worlds that shouldn't cross paths and that, when they do, create something that doesn't resemble anything else.
The first is Rubber Hose, the language of animation invented by the Fleischer studios and the young Disney between 1928 and 1935. Characters with limbs that bent like hoses. Elastic, perpetual, joyful movement. Every object was alive. Every scene had rhythm. It was total animation: the whole world danced.
The second is Art Déco, the architectural and design movement that defined the buildings, posters, interiors and objects of the 1920s and 1930s. Geometric, symmetrical, ambitious. The Chrysler Building. The Paris 1925 exhibitions. The mosaics of metro stations. A language that said: this was built with intent.
Deco-Hose combines them. The elastic fluidity of animation with the architectural solidity of Art Déco. Movement with structure. Lightness with weight.
In practical terms it means this: when we design for Beatrid, edges have curve but they aren't soft. Colors are rich but not chaotic. Characters have elasticity but they live in spaces with real proportions. Typography has personality but also hierarchy.
The result is a system that recognizes itself immediately and isn't confused with anything else. That, in the end, is the only thing we ask of a design system.
This article is part of the studio's series of internal notes. Beatrid documents its decisions because it believes the process is as important as the result.