NPHarvest

From sludge to spotlight: turning a lab-born startup into a brand the world can trust

NPHarvest came in with breakthrough technology and no brand presence. They recover nutrients from wastewater — a technically brilliant process, but one that’s hard to explain. I joined via San Francisco Agency, building on the thoughtful comms work laid by Reetta Ilo.

But, how do you talk about nutrient recovery without sounding like a dry academic paper — or worse, like a sewage manual? My task was to help them look as sharp and innovative as they truly are, while making sure their message was still accessible to the occasional non-scientist. The trick was in finding balance: maintaining credibility with engineers and municipalities, without closing the door on curious outsiders.

The messy middle

Getting the terminology right was a whole journey. Words like "filtration" or "removal" seemed intuitive, but the team was clear: they don’t remove — they recover. That difference mattered. Understanding their tech — from acid tanks to outputs — took deep dives, and turning that complexity into something visual and beautiful was the real lift.

Daniel elevated our visual identity beyond next level. His work brought clarity, consistency, and impact to how we present ourselves - and has gathered plenty of positive feedback from investors and other stakeholders
Sara Ikonen, COO

Designing a Website That Works—for Everyone

For NPHarvest, the website wasn’t just a digital brochure—it was a critical touchpoint for clients, municipalities, investors, and partners to understand the company’s purpose and potential. The challenge? These audiences had very different needs, levels of technical understanding, and expectations.

I approached the design with one clear goal: make it foolproof. Whether you’re a municipal decision-maker, a wastewater treatment plant manager, or an investor looking for climate-tech opportunities, the website should guide you to what you need—without friction, without confusion.

To get there, I ran a series of workshops with the NPHarvest team. Together, we mapped out:
The core story: Why nutrient recovery matters, and how NPHarvest turns waste into value.
The audience needs: What each group comes looking for—and what would convince them to take the next step.
The messaging hierarchy: What goes above the fold, what gets a deeper dive, and how we guide users through the site.
The tone of voice: Clear, no-nonsense, and a little bold—because the technology is solid, and we wanted to reflect that confidence.

A little bit of motion never hurt no one

Sludge isn’t necessarily a fun subject. I used custom SVG animations to lighten the mood, visually dissolving dense sludge into lighter, clearer elements. This subtle effect echoes NPHarvest’s core mission: turning waste into value without the heavy, gloomy vibe.

A Logo That Clears the Way

For the NPHarvest logo, I wanted a typeface that felt technical yet human—a nod to the scientific foundation of the technology without feeling cold or robotic. Trim Mono from Letters from Sweden was the perfect fit: it has a precise, engineered feel, but with a warmth that makes it approachable.

Here’s the subtle twist: I used four weights—SemiBold, Medium, Regular, and Light—next to each other to reflect the idea of nutrient recovery. As the type gets lighter, it mirrors the NPHarvest process: taking dense, heavy waste and transforming it into clean, reusable resources. The logo itself carries a hint of the story—clarity emerging from complexity.

Built for Scale, Designed for Clarity

The NPHarvest logo holds up across all sizes. From the smallest favicon to large-scale applications, its clean lines, monospaced structure, and carefully balanced weights ensure it stays clear, legible, and instantly recognizable—no matter the scale. This versatility makes it a reliable brand asset for any context.

Roll-Ups, Surprisingly Fun

When you’re a startup, events are the name of the game. For NPHarvest, that means dozens of conferences, demo days, and pitch events every quarter — each with a different setup, a different venue, and a different level of chaos. The only constant? There’s always space for a roll-up.

At first, I’ll be honest — it sounded like the least exciting artifact in the whole brand ecosystem. But it turned out to be one of the most satisfying parts. Not only did it give me a chance to write sharp, punchy lines that could grab attention from across a room, it also let me test how flexible and coherent the design system I created really was. Colors, logo weight, grid: it all had to hold up at a meter-wide scale.

Now I kind of love roll-ups. Don’t tell anyone.