Who we are

Lõre is a design consultancy built on experience, perspective and partnership.

With over twenty years in the fashion and retail industry, Lõre brings together strategic product thinking, creative direction, and people-led leadership to help businesses grow with clarity and confidence.

Founded by Mel Castledine, Lõre draws on extensive experience across both retail and supply-side environments, working at scale with some of the UK’s most established brands, as well as supporting emerging and evolving businesses. This dual perspective allows Lõre to identify opportunities holistically, balancing creativity with commercial reality.

Experience That Informs 
Perspective

Mel’s background includes senior leadership roles at businesses such as Next and Morrisons, where she led large, multi-disciplinary design teams and set product direction for businesses valued at hundreds of millions — and in some cases, over a billion pounds in annual sales.

Alongside this, she was a founding member of a UK supplier that scaled rapidly through strategic product development and strong retail partnerships, giving Lõre a deep understanding of end-to-end product journeys, from concept to customer.

This combination of creative leadership, commercial insight, and operational understanding sits at the heart of Lõre’s consultancy work.

  • Lõre is a design consultancy built on experience, perspective, and partnership.

    With over twenty years in the fashion and retail industry, Lõre brings together strategic product thinking, creative direction, and people-led leadership to help businesses grow with clarity and confidence.

  • Lõre values long-term thinking, open collaboration, and trusted relationships. Every engagement begins with listening, understanding the context, challenges and ambitions of the business or individual before shaping a way forward together.

    Whether working with established brands, growing businesses, or emerging designers, the aim is the same: clear direction, considered decisions, and meaningful progress.

  • We work with brands, suppliers, and businesses at moments of change, growth, or refocus. Offering clear product direction, considered strategy, perspective and collaborative leadership

What We Do

We work with brands, suppliers, and businesses at moments of change, growth, or refocus. Offering clear product direction, considered strategy, perspective and collaborative leadership.

Recent consultancy work has included:

  • Guiding product strategy and range direction across multiple categories

  • Supporting business growth and new market opportunities

  • Strengthening team engagement, reviewing structure, and ways of working

  • Acting as a trusted partner between design, buying, and supply chains

The approach is always practical, grounded, and tailored, shaped by an understanding of how product, people, and process together can drive performance.

Click the Portfolio menu to see more work examples.

Supporting Future Talent

In parallel with commercial consultancy, Lõre is committed to mentoring and supporting emerging talent.

Through ongoing work with universities, industry programmes, and The Graduate Fashion Foundation, Mel provides guidance to students and early-career designers, helping bridge the gap between education and industry with honest insight, constructive feedback, and real-world context. 1:1’s are available online at a time to suit both parties, or in person with workshops in university or college setting.

This work reflects a belief that strong, thoughtful product businesses are built not just on ideas, but on people.