ECCLÉ

Marion Design Co approached Ecclé with a design thinking process centered on listening, research, and shared imagination. The collaboration began with deep ethnographic inquiry: studying estuary systems, exploring anthropological insights, and researching artistic traditions across African and Asian diasporas. This helped set aside default Western design structures and opened up a wider palette of visual possibilities.

The ideation stage brought these findings into creative form. Marion Design Co assembled extensive moodboards, collected references from global art histories, and sketched early concepts exploring movement, water, landforms, and organic structure. Typography exploration was equally rigorous, searching for something both rooted in tradition and alive with contemporary expression.

This work led to a distinctive logo mark shaped by estuary waterways. Its organic form reveals a subtle, negative-space “e,” referencing both Ecclé’s name and the visual lineage of illuminated manuscripts in church history. The serif letterforms, based on Elena Genova’s Roca typeface and customized into a multilingual family, embody philosophical depth and gentle fluidity. Imperfect and organic details evoke humanity and ancient wisdom, echoing Ecclé’s desire to nurture creativity through relationships rather than transactions.

In addition to the logo, Marion Design Co created three separate patterns that represent the zones of estuaries from fresh water, to brackish, to salt water. The Weeds pattern (fluvial zone) represents training that happens in the weeds or shallows. The Plus Sign/Fish pattern (mixing zone) represents the connection that can occur by mixing diverse people and ideas. The Waves pattern (marine zone) represents mentoring and navigating deeper waters. These three patterns provide the opportunity for each service-line of Ecclé to own separate design artifacts, lending further clarity to what makes each service unique.

The primary color palette used Seagrass green, representing lush meadows and seaweed to evoke feelings of depth and restoration. Salt off-white represents oyster shells and sea foam to evoke feelings of expansiveness and aliveness. The secondary color palette is made up of warm, vibrant, and nature-based colors that work together in combination to create a naturalistic feeling of creativity, growth, and richness.

Throughout the process, Marion Design Co maintained close communication with Uday and his team, refining concepts, validating cultural references, and ensuring authenticity in every decision. The relational trust built from the Unmute Retreat continued to shape a collaborative, responsive, and joyful creation process.

The resulting Ecclé brand identity is a cohesive and expressive system that captures the organization’s heart: a place where creativity, theology, and global community meet. It provides Ecclé with a professional and culturally sensitive visual voice that stands apart in the non-profit space.

More than a logo, the system delivers a full set of tools that can scale into websites, digital content, print materials, and merchandise. This visual identity communicates both ancient gravitas and contemporary relevance, giving Ecclé the aesthetic grounding it needs to grow its network, attract partners, and support artists and churches in search of creative wholeness.

The work itself is a reflection of the richness of the client–designer relationship: one built on mutual trust, shared mission, and a commitment to designing with and for communities. Through research-driven creativity and collaborative visioning, Marion Design Co helped bring Ecclé to life as an estuary of ideas, a place where diversity becomes strength, creativity becomes healing, and art becomes a pathway for collective flourishing.