Sora Union
Sora Union
The best ideas arise organically. Sora Union founder Nate Dalton and All Turtles’ Phil Libin experienced this as they walked through the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art one day, when a free-flowing conversation took an unexpected turn: as talented people around the globe are increasingly displaced by conflict and climate change, can they find stability in the emerging paradigm of distributed work?
We provided
- Brand + Design
- Intellectual Property
- Finance
- Recruiting
Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not
The answer is a resounding yes. Recognizing that talent is everywhere but opportunity is not, Sora Union was founded on a commitment to reshape the future for at-risk knowledge workers by matching them with stable work opportunities. It’s a grand ambition, and a perfect collaborative fit with All Turtles’ mission.
All Turtles has been a close partner to Sora Union since their founding, beginning with brand creation and continuing into engineering support. With our expertise in recruiting for startups, we’ve also helped Sora Union build out their team across design, engineering, and business operations.
Sora Union’s brand identity had to speak to two core audiences: displaced talent looking for work, and the companies that could benefit from access to their skills and knowledge.
On one hand, Sora Union’s visual identity needed to make people feel inspired, uplifted, and hopeful. On the other, we needed to communicate the values of a hyper-creative, competent, and globally distributed workforce, ready to go.
The encompassing brand value we wanted to capture for Sora Union was that people are what matter.
The word ‘Sora,’ meaning ‘sky’ in Japanese, sounds like ‘soar,’ to fly or rise high in the air. When spoken aloud it feels regal, aspirational, and melodic. It’s an apt metaphor for the mission. War and climate change may force people out of their homelands—but wherever they go, the sky, sunsets, and stars always remain. Times may be hard, but there is always potential for something better.
Instead of being defined by their circumstances, talented workers can be empowered by their own skills and capabilities. Companies seeking professional services can tap into incredible talent that may previously have been unavailable to them. Together, they can soar.
“War and climate change may force people out of their homelands—but wherever they go, the sky, sunsets, and stars always remain.”
An ever-changing, dynamic pallette
What color is the sky right now?
Sora Union’s primary icon comprises three birds in flight, representing a flock of migratory birds—a strong metaphor for community, teamwork, and moving both forward and upward.
As for the sky itself, the simple solution would have been to make it a neutral blue. But the sky is as varied as the cultures represented by Sora’s workforce, ever-changing and dynamic. So we expanded the concept of a brand color system to capture all the changing colors of the sky, connected yet personalized to a viewer’s time zone through a 24-hour system of complementary palettes and gradients.
The final result is a robust identity that exudes the quality, aspiration, and innovation that Sora Union’s big idea demands.