Every child has the right to be happy and curious, but for victims of abuse across the world, this right is shattered. Thorn – a visionary force in the non-profit space – focuses the sharpest minds in the tech and NGO worlds to fight against this. It stands up to traffickers and helps stop the spread of child pornography.

Thorn gained national attention in early 2017 following Co-Founder Ashton Kutcher’s impassioned testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. It partners with the world’s most prominent tech companies including Amazon, Microsoft, Twitter, Google, Yahoo and Intel to help keep platforms safer.

To harness momentum and with a 5-year anniversary approaching, CEO Julie Cordua recognized the opportunity to accelerate the mission and supercharge the organization. She set out to engage more people to join the fight by sharing Thorn’s ambition.

Child sex abuse is a tragic and difficult subject to broach. Our challenge was to set the right tone, inspiring partners to stay engaged and getting new audiences to listen.

After 6 months of in-depth research with law enforcement, donors, government officials, and partners in close collaboration with Thorn’s team, we captured the purpose in the distilled statement: “Until every child can be a kid”.

The new visual identity system celebrates the role of the expanded network, inspired by the idea that it takes more than one thorn to protect the rose. The system can be applied in a singular way or in a dynamic group to express working together as a force. Accompanied by a warmer, more vibrant color palette and a thoughtful approach to photography, it shows the strength of a united front, and offers optimism.

With the production requirements of a non-profit in mind, we produced a hardworking toolkit that allows Thorn’s team to create materials themselves. It includes in-depth digital templates that make it easy for non-designers to produce beautiful content consistently. It also contains communication principles that provide clarity and pave the way for pragmatic action.

The work launched earlier this year, and there’s more about it here in Design Week. We’re excited to see where this organization will go next.