Monterey Surf School was founded in 2025 by big-wave surfer and lifeguard Paul Wetterau, who wanted to serve others by promoting healthy living, and empowering a local culture of environmental love and respect. Beginning at square zero, MSS needed a path forward and the momentum to succeed.
Deliverables
I begin every project by researching a business or entity online and gaining as much information as I can about them, their industry, and relevant history and current events. This is followed by an interview or workshop series with the client to solidify their mission, vision, goals, strategy, positioning, and brand expression.
In Monterey Surf School's case, we had a workshop where we leaned into exploring brand expression.
The workshop helped us understand what makes Monterey Surf School unique and how the owner's personal brand would affect the school. We used free-writing and dot voting to narrow down our focus.
Visually, we decided to play on the juxtaposition between the restrictive stereotype of school and the liberation of playing in the ocean.
Major visual influences were David Carson's early 2000s Surfer Magazine collages, the back of the Sublime album, and my detention-winning sharpie drawings on my desk in 8th grade.
We chose to lean in to the 90s and early 2000s with a strong Grotesque Sans-Serif typeface for the wordmark. We dialed up the David Carson inspiration by chopping the edges of the letterforms to give them a wavy collage feel.
Below are some time-lapse videos of work I did in Procreate. I personally love these videos, but they're currently un-edited, and there are some flashy moments when I'm turning layers on and off. Please take care if you experience epilepsy or light sensitivity.
