Nous Vous brings their “outside of the normal” approach to It’s Nice That’s Unmade project

Known for their abstract, playful, exuberant works that span illustration, ceramics, murals and books of philosophical musings, Nous Vous collective seemed a fitting choice for our unusual brief. When It’s Nice That partnered with innovative wool brand Unmade, we created the concept Future Factory for three commissioned illustrators to work from to design imagery to appear on scarves. Nous Vous’ work is so multifarious and adaptable, it would have been daft not to ask them.

The east London-based collective comprises three Northerners – Jay Cover, William Edmonds and Nicolas Burrows – who pride themselves on showing “there are other ways of operating outside of a normal idea of getting a job and there being this obvious and clear route for you to go down.”

That firm footing on a less trodden path made working with Unmade seem a perfect collaboration for the boys, who took the Future Factory brief and playfully scampered with it. “Sometimes you don’t really know what you’re doing but you’re doing something and it feels quite nice to know that you’re doing something outside of what’s expected or normal,” says Nous Vous. “The design is about the objects that are around us in this studio and at home and in a sort of an abstract way, drawing lines between objects, trying to reference the kind of energy that goes on in our studio, like an idea for the factory of the future.”

The collective’s name translates as “we you” (French, if you were wondering). “It came from a holistic approach where we started to really think about audience and wanting our work to mean something to people,” says Nous Vous.

“Initially we called ourselves We Appreciate You and then [we] started looking at that in different languages. Nous Vous just popped up. It’s a nice reminder to us to make sure that we consider audience, that’s what we do when we’re communicating with people. It’s about the collaboration between the three of us as well, and the collaborations that we have [with the] outside.”