July Brand Guidelines: Australian Design, Personalised Luggage & the Travel Part

July reinvented Aussie luggage.

July is a lesson in design-led product improvement plus personalisation. It’s an Australian company, founded in 2018 in Melbourne by Athan Didaskalou and Richard Li — “Melbourne mates” who met at a café. (An honest, important myth-correction: Athan Didaskalou did not co-found the mattress brand Koala — a common but incorrect claim; his and Li’s prior ventures were unrelated. Two more notes: 2018 is the founding, 2019 was the funding year; and no official brand hex or typeface is published.)

The team approached luggage like a data problem: July reportedly read around 4,000 reviews of existing suitcases to design a better one. The result is premium, design-led hard-shell polycarbonate luggage (a German polycarbonate shell), with a strong emphasis on personalisation — monogramming and printed names on the case — plus a removable power bank for charging, quiet “SilentMove” 360° wheels, and an aircraft-grade aluminium handle. Its newer flagship feature is “CaseSafe” tracking (marketed as a trackable suitcase — a claim best attributed to July, not repeated as fact).

July grew fast on a bold, premium colour range (Moss, Blush, Marine Navy and many more) and a strong physical-retail footprint (around 27 stores across Australia and Asia, plus New York and a Selfridges partnership). It’s a Good Design Award (Australia) winner, and — notably — it remains private and founder-led, having raised A$10.5M in 2019 led by the bag retailer Strandbags (with Lachlan Murdoch among backers). A nice credential: July was the exclusive luggage supplier to the Australian Olympic Team for Paris 2024. Its tagline: “We make the travel part better.” Australian luggage, reinvented.

July lives in a bold, premium colour range. Click a swatch to copy the hex.

July’s identity is built on a bold but premium colour range — mossy greens, blush pinks, marine navies and a large rotating palette of rich, considered colourways. Unlike the muted DTC norm, July leans into confident, saturated colour, but keeps it tasteful and premium rather than loud — turning the suitcase into a personal, expressive, giftable object (reinforced by the monogramming). The colour and personalisation together are central to the appeal. The honest caveat: July publishes no official brand hex, so the moss, blush and navy here are an original, unofficial interpretation of its colourways, not first-party values.

The lesson is confident, premium colour plus personalisation makes a product personal. July’s rich palette and monogramming turn luggage into a personal object. For designers, it’s a reminder that colour and customisation together deepen ownership and gifting appeal. The takeaways: use confident but premium colour to stand out from muted norms; add personalisation to make it personal; and treat specific hexes as unofficial when the palette rotates.

The wordmark is a friendly premium sans — modern and considered.

July’s identity carries a friendly, premium, considered spirit — a clean lowercase “july” wordmark whose warm, modern letterforms read as approachable yet premium and design-led. The friendly type matches a brand built on thoughtful, data-driven product design and personalisation, and it keeps the identity approachable while the bold colour and monogramming add personality. Set against a rich, premium colour range, the type feels modern and inviting — exactly the considered, “make the travel part better” personality July cultivates. It’s friendly and premium rather than austere or heritage, mirroring the personal, colourful luggage. Because the exact wordmark face isn’t publicly documented, the honest description is “a friendly premium sans spirit,” not a named font. The type behaves like the brand: friendly, premium and considered.

July made luggage personal.

July is a lesson in combining rigorous product design with personalisation. Rather than lead with lifestyle marketing, July led with the product: it studied thousands of reviews of existing luggage to engineer a genuinely better case (a tough German polycarbonate shell, quiet wheels, a removable charger), then made it personal through monogramming and a bold, premium colour range. That pairing — better design plus real personalisation — is the brand: it turns a commodity into a considered, personal, giftable object, and it justifies a premium while building emotional ownership (your name on your case, in your colour). Backed by strong physical retail and credentials like the Australian Olympic Team supply, July shows that a challenger can win not just on aesthetics or marketing, but on demonstrably better, more personal product. The lesson is that in a crowded DTC category, doing the product homework and letting customers make it their own can be a durable differentiator. Improve the product, then make it personal.

For designers and brand-builders, July offers a clear takeaway: rigorous product improvement plus personalisation can differentiate a commodity. The lessons: do the product homework (studying thousands of reviews to engineer a better case); make it personal (monogramming, a bold colour range); and back it with real retail and credentials. It’s also a reminder to keep the facts precise — July was founded in 2018 in Melbourne by Athan Didaskalou and Richard Li (not connected to Koala), is known for personalised German-polycarbonate luggage, and is a private, founder-led, Good Design Award winner. July made luggage personal — proof that better product plus personalisation can be the brand.

Keep July’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.