Branding Chapati: A love letter to India’s beautiful chaos.

Melbourne’s Indian dining scene was lively, but predictable. Most restaurants leaned on ornate patterns, muddy browns and beiges, or loud clichés in reds and yellows, each trying to out-spice the other. Somewhere between beige and neon, India’s visual energy often lost its range. The founders reached out while the idea was still simmering. Their aim was bigger than opening just another Indian eatery. They wanted to create a cultural experience that helped Indians in Australia reconnect with home, while staying fresh and fascinating for Australians discovering India for the first time. That meant defining what India feels like, not just what it looks like.

For Dreamjar, this was a ground-up exercise in strategy and storytelling. We didn’t just have to brand a restaurant. We had to shape its very idea, its emotion and its place in the world. It was a chance to rethink how Indian design could be seen, felt and celebrated outside India.

Minimalism has never been our language. Expression has. The country’s visual culture was never built on restraint or silence. It has always spoken in layers, patterns and stories. It never whispered. It celebrated every feeling out loud. From hand-painted signages and movie posters to calendars and truck backs, every surface became a canvas of movement and life. Each brush stroke carried energy and intent. Behind the noise, there has always been balance and purpose. This design language was never made for order. It thrives on emotion. It is maximalism at its most human.

Somewhere along the way, that fearless spirit lost its seat at the branding table. What once shaped how the streets looked hasn’t travelled enough into how the nation presents itself to the world. We wanted to bridge that gap, to bring back the rawness, the craft, the joy. Look closely and you’ll see symmetry hiding within the chaos. Even the loudest truck art or film poster holds balance in its bones. That hidden geometry became our cue. For Chapati, we didn’t want to mute that mayhem. We wanted to make it sing.

The breakthrough came when we reimagined the country through pastels. The goal was not to tone down its spirit but to reframe it. Pastels softened the visual noise while keeping the rhythm intact. They allowed emotion to breathe without overpowering the eye, creating a visual language that felt global yet deeply rooted in cultural energy. The palette balanced that vibrancy with Melbourne’s temperance, introducing a calm and thoughtful contrast to its expressive warmth. The result was a system that felt human, intentional and contemporary.

The same thinking guided how we built the mark. The logo drew from truck art and found balance within symmetry. Its mirrored structure echoed the nation’s visual logic of order and rhythm, creating harmony within play. The outcome was a brand identity that felt expressive without excess. It carried the same mayhem we loved about India, but shaped the beautiful chaos into a form you could feel, not just see.

As Chapati’s identity took shape, so did its purpose. It was never just about serving food. It was about serving something far bigger, a feeling, a culture, a memory. That truth became the brand’s core and its tagline, India, served. Two words with two meanings: offering warmth and nostalgia to Indians away from home, while introducing its spirit to Australians with wonder and intrigue.

It wasn’t written, it was lived. Every colour, illustration and phrase carried that intent. The brand stopped talking about where it came from and started expressing what it stood for: emotion, rhythm and craft. What emerged was a design system that felt generous and alive, layered with stories yet calm at heart. It gave shape to an idea that could be seen, felt and tasted all at once.

Every colour, character and composition carried a conversation of its own, alive with people, moments, traditions and stories. Some were everyday, some were long forgotten. Beneath all that colour and chaos sat quiet symmetry. Balance within energy and rhythm within noise. Together, these ideas shaped what we like to call the Navrasas of Chapati’s visual world. Nav means nine, and Rasas means emotions. Nine feelings that turned design into experience. Each one became a pillar of Chapati’s language, together forming its emotional spectrum.

Fun fact: This project went on to win India’s Best Design Award 2021, Afaqs! Foxglove Award 2022 (Regional Silver) and Afaqs! Foxglove Award 2022 (National Bronze).

Even more fun fact: We didn’t even enter the Foxglove Nationals. They gave it an honorary win.