I have a confession.
When Tammie Osborne first came to me in 2021, she wanted to call her women’s co-working space Diana’s Place. I loved Tammie immediately. I did not love that name. And this is the story of how we got from Diana’s Place to The Sapphire Suite — and why I am now the self-appointed mayor of the whole operation.
Pull up a chair, friend. This one’s a good one.
How It All Started: A Networking Event, a Big Vision, and a Designer Who Could Not Stay Neutral
Tammie and I met at Women Connect in 2021. If you don’t know Women Connect, it’s one of Nashville’s best women’s networking groups, and it’s exactly the kind of room where big ideas get hatched over coffee and someone inevitably ends up hiring someone else before they’ve finished their first pastry.
That is more or less what happened with us.
Tammie had a vision that I found genuinely thrilling: a women-only co-working space in the Franklin area, built not just around desks and WiFi but around real, in-person community. A place where women entrepreneurs could actually show up for each other in the same room on the same day. In a world that had just spent two years going entirely virtual, this felt radical and necessary and wonderful.
I was immediately, embarrassingly sold. I couldn’t hide my enthusiasm if I tried. I was the person nodding so enthusiastically across the table that I’m surprised my neck survived it.
Here’s something I’ve come to believe about business relationships: when someone is genuinely excited about your idea, not politely excited, not professionally excited, but actually lit up by it, you notice. I think that’s why Tammie hired me. My excitement was real, and she could tell.
What she could not have anticipated was that I would have opinions about the name.
The Naming Journey: Three Names, One Very Strong Designer Opinion
Let me walk you through what is, in hindsight, one of my favorite branding stories to tell.
Name Attempt One: Diana’s Place
Diana’s Place was sweet. It was personal. I have no doubt it meant something to Tammie. But here’s the problem: it told absolutely nobody what the business was. If you heard Diana’s Place with no context, you might think it was a diner. A bed and breakfast. A boutique. A daycare run by a woman named Diana.
You would not think: this is a professionally designed women’s co-working space in Franklin, Tennessee where female entrepreneurs gather to build businesses and support each other.
A name has to do work. Diana’s Place wasn’t working. We moved on.
Name Attempt Two: The Crown Room
Now we were getting somewhere. The Crown Room had the royalty energy Tammie was after. It felt elevated and intentional and feminine. I was excited.
And then I started the design research.
Every single reference image I pulled gave me Crown Royal whiskey, dark velvet, leather bar stools, and speakeasy lighting. Not a single one said women’s co-working community. My gut told me immediately that no matter how beautiful the brand execution, the name The Crown Room was going to confuse people in the exact wrong direction. We were going to accidentally build a brand that made people think there was a password at the door and cocktails on the menu.
We scrapped it.
The Breakthrough: Princess Diana and a Sapphire Ring
This is where it got good.
Tammie knew she wanted royalty. She knew she wanted something that felt elevated and feminine and distinctive. And one day, in the middle of what was probably our fifth naming conversation, the connection clicked.
Princess Diana. The most iconic royal of the modern era. And what is Princess Diana famous for, jewelry-wise?
Her sapphire engagement ring.
The Sapphire Suite.
We both said it and then we both went quiet for a second because when a name is right, you feel it. It’s warm and specific and immediately communicates the vibe without doing too much. It’s royalty without the whiskey bar. It’s feminine without being fussy. It’s something you want to walk into.
The Sapphire Suite was born, and it was right the moment we said it out loud. That is the best possible outcome in a naming process, and it doesn’t always happen. We got lucky. Or we earned it. Probably a little of both.
Building the Brand Before the Business Existed
Here’s the part of this story that every pre-launch business owner needs to hear, because it applies to far more people than just Tammie.
We built The Sapphire Suite’s brand and website before the space had opened. Before there were events. Before there was a community. Before anyone had walked through the door on a regular Tuesday to co-work in the kitchen and strike up a friendship that would later become a business collaboration.
All we had was a handful of staged photos and a very clear vision.
That is the reality of pre-launch branding: you are building a promise, not a documentation. You are saying “this is what we intend to be” before you have proof that you got it right. And that takes a specific kind of faith, both from the business owner and from the designer.
We did our best with what we had. The original brand leaned into jewel tones, the crown icon, and that feminine royalty feeling we’d been chasing since before we found the name. It was beautiful for what it was. It communicated the vision clearly. And it served The Sapphire Suite exactly as well as any pre-launch brand can, which is to say: perfectly for the moment and temporarily for the future.
Because a brand built on vision alone can only take you so far. Eventually, the business you actually built shows up. And when it does, your brand has to be ready to grow with it.
More on that in the next post. (And trust me, the four-year glow-up is worth seeing.)
The Part Where I Become Mayor
Fast forward four years. I have been showing up at The Sapphire Suite with an almost suspicious level of consistency. BizBrews, the monthly mastermind event where the community gathers to workshop each other’s business problems. Co-working sessions. Networking events. The kinds of evenings where you walk in as an acquaintance and walk out as someone’s business bestie.
I welcomed people. I introduced people who should know each other. I was genuinely, helplessly, constitutionally unable to just show up and sit quietly.
Then one day at a BizBrews session, Heather Adams, founder of Choice Media Communications and one of the most perceptive humans I know, looked around the room and said something I was not prepared for:
“Gosh, it’s like you’re the mayor of The Sapphire Suite.”
Reader, I have never recovered.
I took that title and I ran with it. I have an embroidered scarf. I have an Instagram account, @MayorMakena, that my friends find deeply hilarious. I welcome new members like it is my civic duty. I know where the extra coffee filters are and I will tell you without being asked.
The reason I’m sharing this is not just because it’s funny, although it is. It’s because it illustrates something important about what The Sapphire Suite became. A business built on community, if it does its job correctly, creates this kind of thing. It creates people who show up not because they have to but because they want to. People who feel ownership over the energy of the room. People who become, for all intents and purposes, unpaid ambassadors who could not stop talking about the place if they tried.
When a business creates that level of community, the brand has to be able to hold it. It has to be strong enough and clear enough and true enough to the real experience of the space that every new person who encounters it thinks: yes, this is exactly what I was looking for.
That’s the whole point. That’s why branding matters.
“Makena has been part of The Sapphire Suite story since before we even had a name. She didn’t just design our brand — she helped us figure out who we were. Four years later, she’s still the person I trust most to make sure we look as good as we feel.”
— Tammie Osborne, Founder, The Sapphire Suite
The Business Lesson You Actually Came Here For
Here’s what I want you to take away from this story, whether you’re a Nashville business owner, a solopreneur in the early stages of building something, or someone who has been running a business for years and quietly suspects your brand has not kept up with you.
You cannot fully brand something before it exists. You can vision-board it and mood-board it and name it something brilliant. You can build a logo and a color palette and a website. All of that matters. But the truest version of your brand is something you discover over time, through actually running the business, serving real clients, and learning what your people actually need from you.
The Sapphire Suite had four years of reality to work with by the time we rebuilt the brand and the website. Four years of events and community and real, human moments that a pre-launch photoshoot could never have captured. That is not a flaw in the original brand. That is a gift. It means the business actually grew.
The question is not whether your brand will need to evolve. It will. The question is whether you’ll have the self-awareness to notice when it’s time, and the courage to do something about it.
Want to see the full brand refresh? Read Part Two here. →
Not sure what your brand is actually communicating?
Download The Anatomy of a Perfect Brand, our free guide that walks you through every element of a strong brand identity. It’s the first thing I’d hand you if we were sitting across from each other at BizBrews.
Comment BRAND ANATOMY on our latest Instagram post and we’ll send it straight to your DMs. ✨
Ready to Build a Brand That Grows With You?
If this story resonates with you, if you’re somewhere in the middle of building something and you know your brand either isn’t quite right yet or has already outgrown what you launched with, I’d genuinely love to talk.
At Makena Creative, nashville branding is what we do, and we do it with the kind of strategic care that comes from actually understanding your business before we touch a single design element. Every project starts with a deep strategy session, because a beautiful brand built on the wrong foundation is just a pretty problem.
Here’s how to take the next step:
Curious what your brand might be missing? Download The Anatomy of a Perfect Brand for free — comment BRAND ANATOMY on Instagram and we’ll send it right to you.
Want to see what we’ve built for other businesses? Explore our portfolio →
Ready to talk about your brand? Book a connection call →
And if you’re local to Nashville and looking for the most supportive, beautiful co-working community in Franklin — this is your sign. Visit The Sapphire Suite →
You deserve a brand that tells your story as well as Tammie’s tells hers, friend. Let’s build it.
xo, Makena
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Nashville branding and how do I find the right designer?
Nashville branding refers to brand identity and strategy work done for businesses in the Nashville and Middle Tennessee area. When looking for a nashville branding designer or boutique branding agency, the most important thing is finding someone who starts with strategy before aesthetics. Your brand should be built on a deep understanding of your business, your audience, and your goals — not just your color preferences. A good designer asks a lot of questions before they open a design program.
How do I know if my business name is working?
A strong business name does at least two things: it communicates something meaningful about what you do or who you serve, and it creates an emotional response that aligns with your brand. If your name is so personal that only people who already know you understand it, it might be working against you. The naming process for The Sapphire Suite is a good example of refining until something clicks — you’ll know when it’s right.
Do I need a brand before I launch?
Yes, but with realistic expectations. Your launch brand is a starting point, not a final answer. You’ll do your best with what you know about your business before it opens its doors, and you’ll almost certainly refine it after a few years of reality. The goal at launch is a brand that’s clear, professional, and true to your vision — not a brand that has to be perfect forever.
What does a boutique branding agency actually do?
A boutique branding agency handles the strategy and visual identity work that defines how your business presents itself to the world. This includes your logo, color palette, typography, brand voice, and the overarching visual system that ties everything together. A boutique agency typically offers a more hands-on, personalized experience than a large firm — you work closely with the designer rather than being handed off to a team of people you’ve never met. At Makena Creative, every brand and website project is led directly by Makena.
How long does a brand and website project take?
Most full brand and website projects through Makena Creative are completed within eight to twelve weeks from kickoff. The timeline depends on the scope of the project and how quickly we receive client assets like photography. We guide every client through the process with clear timelines and consistent communication so there are no surprises.
