Portico Investment: Helping them build confidence before asking people to invest

Helping Portico Investment build trust through distinctive website design, bespoke illustrations, and a customer journey designed around confidence.

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The challenge

Portico Investment helps people invest in carefully selected property schemes. Their experience and track record were already well established, but their website didn’t communicate the confidence that clients feel when speaking to them.

Like many businesses in financial services, Portico Investment had relied heavily on familiar imagery and generic messages about investment. Their old website explained what the company did, but not why someone should trust Portico Investment with one of the biggest financial decisions. My challenge was to create an experience that inspires confidence before visitors even picked up the phone.

My approach

People rarely invest because they’ve read every paragraph on a website. They invest because they have confidence in the people behind the opportunity. That meant my design couldn’t begin with property. It had to begin with trust.

Rather than filling their pages with stock photographs of apartment blocks or smiling investors, I developed a visual language that reflects balance and connections. I designed every element to reinforce the message that Portico Investment are experienced professionals who help people invest with confidence.

The structure of the website is equally important. Instead of overwhelming visitors with products, I organised the content around the questions people naturally ask before making an investment, helping them understand not only what Portico Investment offers, but why clients continue to trust them.

The solution

The Portico Investment website combines bespoke animated illustrations, editorial layouts, and carefully structured content to create a distinctive visual identity. Rather than relying on stock imagery, I developed a set of abstract illustrations which communicate ideas rather than decorate pages.

Behind the scenes, I designed and developed a prototype using Eleventy. That wasn’t because the finished website would use Eleventy. I knew that it wouldn’t. I built it because a fully functioning prototype communicates design decisions far more effectively than static mock-ups or Figma files.

This prototype allowed Portico Investment to experience the website exactly as a customer would. It also gave theie WordPress development team a working reference for every element and behaviour. This resulted in a smooth handover with far less room for misinterpretation.

Behind the design

This project involved more than designing attractive pages. I explored dozens of illustration concepts before finding a visual language that reflects Portico Investment’s values. I refined every element until it communicates the message of balance and security.

At the same time, I reorganised the content, refined the typography, developed layout templates, and built a fully functioning Eleventy prototype that demonstrated every interaction in context. I’ve found this approach dramatically improves collaboration with development teams, as instead of interpreting design files, developers receive a working website that already answers many of the questions that inevitably arise during implementation.

The result

This new website positions Portico Investment as a trusted adviser rather than just another property investment company. Clear messaging, a strong visual identity, and a deliberate journey all help investors understand both the investment opportunities and the people promoting them them.

The animated illustrations give Portico Investment an identity that’s immediately recognisable, while the structured content makes complex financial information easier to navigate. Perhaps most importantly, the prototype provided Portico Investment and their WordPress team a shared understanding of exactly how the finished website should behave, helping preserve the integrity of my design throughout implementation.

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Stuff & Nonsense have designed multiple websites for our business, and we have been consistently impressed with their work. They take the time to fully understand the brief and regularly present creative ideas and perspectives that we hadn’t considered.

What this project demonstrates

Financial websites earn trust through clarity, consistency, and confidence. That’s why I approach these projects as communication challenges rather than marketing exercises. Content, illustration, interactions, layout, and typography all need to reinforce the same message. When these elements work together, visitors spend less time questioning the website and more time understanding the business behind it. This helps investors feel confident about the people they’re investing with.