Ross Gendels
Associate Creative Director, Creative Director, Designer, Design Director
In their own words
The frame of the browser is treated like a game hud [a visual overlay on the screen that shows important information during gameplay] and the contents like a paperback anthology. It’s clean because the stories are loud and we don’t want the frame to compete.
is to quest.
If everyone is building their own reality, why can’t I?
Sci-fi and fantasy can be tools for clarity.
Good speculative fiction is world-building – so is branding.
A brand is like a little world you get to step into.
The meticulous process of harvesting the leaves, the blend of tradition with innovation in processing, and the simplicity of three ingredients coming together to create something extraordinary were all key elements that shaped our approach.
We wanted every particle to feel organic and alive, capturing the essence of matcha in motion.
Green is a super relevant code in the matcha space, but we wanted to use it in a way that felt unique and surprising.
We avoided trend-chasing in favour of building something timeless.
Articles & interviews
- Quest designs each web fiction story as its own world
Quest is a web-native sci-fi and fantasy magazine founded by Ross Gendels and Zane Miller, in which every fiction piece receives its own typeface, artwork, colour world and page design. Ross led the design and creative direction of the site with Ji Park, Tiger Dingsun and Teo Tsivranidis, using a clean browser frame styled as a game HUD around expressive editorial worlds. Issue 2 launched in August 2026 with nine stories, an essay, a dispatch, 11 artists and 11 typefaces; print editions of the first two issues are in progress.
- Ross Gendels on using sci-fi and fantasy to examine the modern world
The Brand Identity interviews Base Design Associate Creative Director Ross Gendels about his independent magazine Quest, which uses sci-fi and fantasy as frameworks to explore politics, culture, and society. Gendels discusses the magazine’s reader-funded model, its collaborative digital design, and how speculative fiction informs his approach to branding and world-building. The conversation highlights Quest’s community-driven ethos and its blend of editorial experimentation and visual storytelling.
- "POV Budapest Showcases Base Design's Unique Branding Approach"