Building one brand across the screen, the stage, and the shelf.

A Chinese music-education brand, learning to speak to an American audience

Nine Beats Drummer Academy is the U.S. campus network of Nine Beats, a music education group founded in 2003 in Tianjin, China. Over two decades the brand grew into a network of more than 1,200 campuses across 500-plus Chinese cities, training hundreds of thousands of students under thousands of instructors.

In partnership with internationally touring drummer and educator Thomas Lang, Nine Beats opened its first U.S. campuses in Irvine and Los Angeles, bringing its drum, guitar, bass, and keyboard curriculum to Southern California students of every age and level. As the academy’s in-house designer, I own how that brand shows up everywhere a student or parent actually encounters it — the website they browse before enrolling, the festival stage that puts the school in front of thousands of families, and the merchandise counter that turns students into walking ambassadors.

Website: a home that reads as performance-grade, not franchise-grade

The brief was to move the site away from a generic lesson-studio template and toward something that reflects the academy behind it — a school whose faculty includes internationally touring musicians and a curriculum already proven on hundreds of thousands of students overseas.

I’m leading the redesign from the ground up: a full-bleed hero built on live-performance photography, instrument tracks (drums, electric guitar, and more) separated into their own dedicated course pages, and a consistent Book Now / View Course action across every page so a visitor’s path from browsing to booking never changes shape.

Typography and color carry the brand’s identity system into the browser — a warm display serif against a quiet, gallery-white ground — so the site reads as considered and editorial rather than templated. Currently in progress.

Events: turning the brand into a room full of drummers

Beyond the screen, I plan and design the academy’s flagship public events — including the LA International Drummers Festival, “Voices of Drums,” and Hundred Drums, a large-format ensemble showcase built around dozens of kits performing in unison.

My scope covers the full production, not just the visuals: scouting and booking Southern California venues, building the run-of-show, designing posters and on-screen title graphics, and coordinating with co-organizing partners and guest artists — including festival headliner Thomas Lang.

On site, the brand extends into the physical room: stage backdrops, projected title sequences, and signage, so a 500-seat concert hall carries the same visual identity as the website and the merch table.

After the show, Thomas Lang held a signing session for young drummers and their families — a moment I helped stage and schedule as part of the event’s closing block.

Merchandise: a shop window into the brand

I designed Nine Beats’ retail collection and the shop-in-shop displays at the Irvine campus — backpacks, caps, tote bags, drinkware, apparel, and branded drum hardware — plus Rock Xiaojiu, an original mascot character built to give the brand a friendlier, kid-facing voice.

The collection uses a candy-bright secondary palette — teal, plum, black, wine — layered over the brand’s core maroon-and-cream identity, so the shelf reads as playful for younger students without breaking from the more serious tone set by the website and the festival stage.

Rock Xiaojiu appears across hang-tags, apparel graphics, and in-store signage — a second, warmer register aimed at families and younger drummers, sitting alongside the brand’s performance-grade instruments and gear.

One brand, three rooms

Across web, event, and retail, the working principle was the same: a visitor should recognize Nine Beats whether they’re scrolling the homepage, sitting in a concert hall, or picking up a tote bag at the front desk.