Made.com's 'Live Unboxed' platform shot furniture like a fashion label

Build a platform on the company truth that Made.com always reacted against category clichés and expected ways of living, then carry it across every channel.

Fabula's debut campaign for the brand launched 15 August 2016 across print, online, social and OOH, photographed by Michele Yong with art direction and copy by Scott Taylor and Andy Shrubsole, staged in homes furnished with Made.com pieces.

Became the brand's standing platform, rolled out across Made.com's channels and subsequent campaigns; no performance figures were published.

In August 2016, furniture retailer Made.com launched 'Live Unboxed', a new brand platform and campaign created by Fabula — the agency's first work since winning the account — spanning print, online, social and out-of-home from 15 August.

The executions showed home life played out in unexpected ways: a party in a living room furnished with Made.com pieces captioned 'I don't stay in. I stay up', and two women playing table tennis on a Made.com dining table captioned 'I don't serve. I play.' Luke Williamson noted the work 'has been shot to appear more like a fashion brand than a traditional furniture brand', reflecting the mentality of the business and its consumer.

Brand director Win Kwok anchored the platform in a company truth — Made.com 'always reacting against category clichés and expected ways of living' — and described working with Fabula as 'akin to working with partners rather than an agency'. The platform was designed to live across all communication channels and upcoming campaigns.

The platform turned an internal habit — reacting against category clichés — into the advertising idea itself.

Fashion-brand photography codes gave a furniture retailer a different shelf in the customer's mind.

The two-line captions ('I don't serve. I play.') made the furniture a prop for living, not the subject of worship.

It was built as a platform, not a campaign: every later channel and activity was expected to carry it.

Category clichés are a positioning gift: photograph furniture with fashion's energy and write captions against type, and the brand inherits the rebellion.

'Live Unboxed' launched on 15 August 2016 in OOH and ran across Made.com's Instagram, Facebook and other channels as its standing platform, with Fabula collaborating on subsequent campaign activities. No performance figures were published at launch.