Our people and process
Meet the managing directors of Ethical Design Co.
Sonja is a veteran in sustainable design and human-centred design with over 18 years of industry experience. She excels in all forms of communication and experience design, as well as WordPress development. Prior to EDCo., Sonja ran a successful design business for 8 years as a location-independent 'digital nomad,' working with clients worldwide across various industries. EDCo. was a natural evolution from her previous work. Sonja holds a Graduate Diploma in Design Anthropology and a Diploma in Sustainability. Her career has always been driven by a commitment to sustainable and ethical design practices. She's travelled the world in pursuit of answers to the planet's most pressing challenges and is dedicated to making a positive impact through her work.
Caitlin is the glue that holds everything together. She holds a Graduate Diploma in International Community Development. She has experience working with a number of human rights and environmental non-profit organisations, as well as in corporate office environments. Caitlin is skilled in supporting creatives and clients and works hard to keep everyone happy and organised throughout the design and development process. Her strength lies in building successful relationships with people from various backgrounds and providing the support necessary to help teams, communities, and cultures thrive. She has a keen eye for design and is passionate about working with clients that share our ethos in designing for a sustainable future.
We work with an amazing team of specialists. Depending on the scope of your project you may be working with one or more of our support team.
Riley is an ethical business design specialist who is obsessive about adding visual exclamation marks to his creative work. His ethos is about making small positive impacts wherever possible. Riley is an all-rounder in the design world whose skillset touches a variety of areas from web design to motion graphics to illustration, and user experience design. With a background in marketing, Riley likes to gain an understanding of organisational objectives and craft designs that speak clearly and engagingly to desired audiences. He has been a designer for 9 years and hopes to bring to life human-centred, philanthropic projects for many more years to come.
Luke has over 18 years’ experience in web/app development, digital and print graphic design, branding and art direction. He is a certified Webflow expert who loves building beautiful interactive websites enhanced with animation and effect. Luke lived and worked in Vietnam for 5 years, returning home to Australia in 2017. While there, he continued to work as a freelance designer/developer, did volunteer work, launched various startups and founded a coffee shop. When not pushing pixels from the home studio, he and his wife, Sarah, are busy renovating their old mid-century holiday shack in the bush on the outskirts of Melbourne.
Lisa develops quality, fast and secure WordPress websites, serving businesses, creatives and agencies. At EDCo., Lisa partners with us to support our WordPress projects. Each website is carefully coded in her Melbourne studio. The outcome for Lisa's clients is a user-friendly website that staff can easily manage, with design elements that are unique, functional and lightweight. Specialising in PHP, JavaScript, HTML and CSS, she has all the right tools to build you a desktop and mobile-friendly website from the ground up. Lisa is currently taking a sabbatical to spend more time with her young family.
Shan loves bringing ideas to life. With creativity at her core, she aspires to be a designer who faces global issues especially within the sustainability realm. Shan recently completed a Communication Design (Honours) degree at Swinburne University, and she has also studied abroad at the University of Cincinnati’s DAAP College – one of the most respected design schools worldwide. Shan exudes strong communication skills, attention to detail and lateral thinking across her client briefs and projects. Optimistic and motivated, she aims to grow her eco-headspace in contributing towards a responsible design future.
Angela is a Melbourne-based author, book industry professional and teacher of writing and publishing. She holds a Doctor of Creative Arts from Western Sydney University. She has created and edited content for a range of industries, including education, sustainability, fashion, and finance. As a book editor, she has worked on award-winners and bestsellers for Australian and UK publishing houses. Her debut novel, 'A Superior Spectre' (Ventura Press), was shortlisted for five awards, and her novella, 'Joan Smokes,' won the inaugural Mslexia Novella Award (UK). Her stories and essays have been widely published in magazines, journals and newspapers. Angela's acclaimed second novel, Moon Sugar, was released in October 2022. In her collaboration with EDCo., she crafts creative, considered and clean content for websites, corporate publications and more.
An EDCo. project typically goes through three elevations.
‘Mt. Discovery’ is where we set our pace, carefully researching and organising brief, scope, costs, strategy, and a schedule for your project.
‘The Designer’s Crag’ is a journey through design. We work up to creative solutions through UX design, brand design, UI design, web design, and print design – depending on what your project requires.
At ‘Execution Summit’ we stride through the technical phase. This may include digital development, website builds, file packaging, sustainable printing, and training and handover.
"Working with Ethical Design Co. was a rewarding and inspirational experience. They were responsible for the content development, website design and web development of the Brotherhood of St. Laurence's 2023 Annual report. They also produced a 52-page full report and 4-page summary report version and managed the printing of everything including our financial report. The result was spectacular! I would definitely recommend them and look forward to working with them again."
"It's such a pleasure to work with the professional and friendly team at Ethical Design Co. Their creative vision is compelling, and the results speak for themselves. We love our new philanthropy pages! Thank you Ethical Design Co."
"Ethical Design Co. have designed and printed a number of documents for our organisation, from simple flyers to complex reports, plus new brand guidelines, and we have been extremely happy with everything they have produced. Such a lovely team, too! Highly recommended."
"I engaged Ethical Design Co. to turn my dreams and visualizations into reality. From the very beginning of our engagement on the projects of logo and branding, advertising materials, and website design and development, Ethical Design Co.’s professionalism and eye for design was apparent. I was impressed with their suggested improvements on my concepts, felt confident in leaving them in charge of design decisions and have continued to be impressed with the projects on completion. I recommend Ethical Design Co. if you are after a quality service with sleek and sophisticated results."
"I have worked with Ethical Design Co. on multiple projects and will continue to work with them in the future. They have been an amazing partner who has helped on projects as large as our rebranding strategy for three brands, to brand guidelines to our quarterly reporting. In all of these projects, they have provided a fresh perspective/design that has been impressive. Working with them is professional and easy without a single deadline missed. I would recommend them for all design work."
“I can't thank you enough and honestly couldn't recommend the team at EDCo. any more highly! Your work is truly professional and has encapsulated the core of my business better than even I could've hoped for!”
"The team at Ethical Design Co. designed the whole look and feel of our brand, something we are now proud to display. Because of the professionalism shown from the very first talks we had with them, we were able to put many creative decisions into their hands. When launching another business, I would not hesitate to get them involved from the very start. As a bonus, they deliver work on time too."
"As a specialist solutions consulting group that provides information and analytic services to our corporate clients, we engaged with Sonja Meyer to help add an additional level of professional design to our solutions. From our very first engagement with Sonja we quickly realised that we received more than just her wonderful designs. Other qualities like her professionalism, experience and fast turnaround have enriched our projects to a point where Sonja’s involvement has become a constant feature in our projects that have a high graphic or visualisation component."
"Sonja has a fine eye for beauty. Her work is elegant and she has a remarkable capacity to reflect the taste of her clients. She is silken smooth to work with. She meets her deadlines, provides accurate information when required, contributes grace and intelligence to the development of every project. I am forever recommending her, and I recommend her again, here and now, to you."
"We often seek out Sonja’s assistance on UI/UX designs on particularly creative challenges that our internal designers get blocked on. Her work is always delivered timely and is always above the quality expected. Every time we deliver Sonja’s designs to a client they are blown away."
"Sonja has been our go-to designer for all our web-based needs, designing our web platform from initial mock-ups to a fully functioning product. She is a thoughtful, and nimble designer responding to our requirements and our user’s needs whilst retaining a clear vision for simple, engaging and user-friendly design. She manages to fit in with the fast-paced demands of an early stage start-up whilst continually creating beautiful designs for us. I would thoroughly recommend Sonja as a partner in design and we feel lucky to have found her!"
"As the owner of a small business and a design novice, it's been a pleasure to deal with EDCo. Their designs met my brief perfectly, making my business branding a breeze. Sonja is exceptionally professional and her designs are elegant. Over the years I have been in business I have always chosen to return to Sonja for any design needs. Her work has always been delivered well within deadlines with the assurance that all measures have been taken with environmental sustainability in mind - giving me peace of mind as well as strong branding. Thank you Sonja!"
"Sonja has worked closely with me in designing our circa 30-page pitch deck, investor summary slides, and other multi-page presentations needed to pitch key partners. She also designed, top to bottom, our crowd funding page. Sonja is an incredible designer, but she also is a great instructor too. Most importantly, Sonja is a pleasure to work with. There’s no BS, she is prompt and hardworking. Her performance has been consistently high and turnaround quick whether she’s working from home base in Melbourne or from a remote island in Vietnam. We will continue to use her services for the foreseeable future."
