02. Sustainable Ocean Alliance
↑ One template, every hub: Ocean Hub Spotlight series, 2021–22 ↑
Sustainable Ocean Alliance backs the young leaders and ocean startups working to restore the health of the ocean in our lifetime.
A youth network in 165 countries.
An accelerator, microgrants and a venture fund.
376 ocean solutions accelerated by the end of 2023.
What they were after
More funding and more awareness, with a number to chase. SOA's first goal was 100 ocean solutions by 2021. They hit 222. The next goal was 1,000.
An org asking funders to back that kind of ambition has to look like it can deliver.
What was in the way
When I came in, in March 2021, SOA looked like a lot of orgs I've worked with since. A budget identity. Stock blues, a wave logo, a condensed font. Fine, and forgettable.
Social was the main channel, and it was busy. Twenty to forty Instagram posts a month, plus Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Local hubs, the accelerator, microgrants, policy campaigns. Each story went out looking a little different, so none of them added up to one org.
The in-house designer's time went where it had to, to the decks and the CEO's comms. Social got whatever was left.
For an org asking for millions, it didn't read as credible.
Before
After
↑ SOA's 2020 brand guidelines, and the feed a year into the template system ↑
Fix what people see every day.
The call
Before anyone touched the logo. A rebrand was always on the horizon, but SOA published something almost every day, and that's where people actually met the brand. So the first call was templates: one format for each kind of story they told. Hub spotlights, accelerator news, education series, campaigns. Same type, same crops, same rhythm, whether the post was about a hub in Malaysia or the fight over deep seabed mining.
In 2022 we pushed it further with a brand refresh, built with SOA's senior designer. New colors, type, textures, and rules for photography. She took the first round through the stakeholders. I built on top. The point was more punch right away, and a bridge to a proper global rebrand later.
↑ The template system, 2021 (top), and the 2022 refresh (bottom) ↑
What I did
Started at 20 hours a week. Ended up full-time, and exclusive for the last two years.
The template system, then the refresh. The campaigns, including the launch of SOA's 222 solutions report, World Oceans Day, and the deep seabed mining push around COP15. Pitch decks, donor two-pagers, impact reports, event collateral. Strategy and posting sat with the social media manager, and we planned each month together.
For more than six months I was the only designer, covering both senior design roles.
One campaign gets its own page: the Youth & Innovation Forum, ahead of the 2022 UN Ocean Conference.
Read the campaign →
↑ Launch campaign for the 222 solutions report ↑
↑ Pitch deck for the Aspen Ideas Festival, 2022 ↑
↑ Youth Alliance for a Deep Seabed Mining Moratorium, 2022 ↑
↑ Deep seabed mining series around COP15, 2022 ↑
None of it shipped.
↑ Unreleased, 2023: the new website and the Making Waves newsletter ↑
The rebrand that didn't ship
In late 2022 SOA brought in an outside agency for a global rebrand. What arrived was a strategy we could work with and an identity with no system to run it.
My job became making it usable. The mark stayed. Everything around it got rebuilt: color, type, an asset bank, templates, and a full website redesign. Eight months later it was ready to launch.
Leadership decided to start over.
What changed
The refresh carried SOA through two of its biggest moments: the UN Ocean Conference and the 222 solutions report. The same system was still in use when I left in 2024.
The rebrand has no results to report, because it never launched.
How I work
A brand only ships if the person who signs it off is in the room from the first stylescape. I ask for that now, every time.
And I start with what an org publishes every day. That's where the brand actually lives.
Tell me what isn't landing
If something specific is coming up — a report, a campaign, a rebrand you're not sure about — say what it is. I'll tell you straight whether a read is the right thing, or whether it isn't.
Or email hello@graphikas.design