Village One is a studio with strong values. Our goal is to win over clients and projects we feel genuinely excited about—that leads to the best work, after all. Below are our wishlist, the red lines we won’t cross and a few personal statements from members.
Projects: wishlist / blocklist
Wishlist
We definitely want to hear from you if your project falls into the following fields / industries / subject matters:
- Journalism and publishing, books and magazines
- Culture and arts (music, museums, theaters, …)
- Climate activism and technology
- Democratic governments, democracy tech
- Progressive political parties
- Non-profits, foundations, NGOs
- Public transport and public infrastructur
- Open-source and libre software, open data
- Universities, schools and education in general
- Vegan and organic food, regenerative agriculture
- Cooperatives, unions, solidarity economy, citizen initiatives
- Green energy, green banking, slow fashion
- Independent companies with a strong design focus (studios, type foundries, …)
- Companies with a commitment to realizing one or more of the United Nations' 17 Sustainable Development Goals
Got something to team up on? Let us know!
Blocklist
We respectfully decline if your project revolves around the following:
- Everything directly related to fossil fuels
- Cars, car culture and car-centric infrastructure
- Industrial meat and dairy
- Promotion of tobacco or alcohol
- Traditional banking, blockchain and crypto products
- Guns and weapons manufacturing, military applications
- Surveillance technology
- Gambling, betting, prediction markets
- Misinformation, disinformation, spam, scams
- Companies in fast food, fast fashion and the gig economy
- Generative AI startups built on (or building) models without transparency around training data
- Organisations promoting an unhealthy or unsustainable work environment (hustle culture, union busting, …)
Dream clients and personal comments
We asked our members about their absolute dream projects, here’s what they said:
Doro:
I would love to work with organizations that are fighting for social justice and promote equity. I’m interested in projects with cities, communities, neighborhoods and urban planning—all about infrastructure that enhances people’s quality of life. Organisations I would like to cooperate with: public libraries, VHS (Volkshochschulen Berlin), Karuna eG, Reporter Ohne Grenzen
Christoph:
I’d love to work with local and public institutions; my dream would be to create a new and better digital tool for public libraries—for both citizens and librarians. I think public libraries have so much potential in our communities, and digital infrastructure is crucial there. I could also imagine that teaming up with consumer protection services or independent product testers (like Stiftung Warentest) could be fun and interesting, and quite relevant in the digital consumerist realm we live in. And, as these publications really inspired me when I was a teenager, I’d love to work with editorial teams like fluter.de from the bpb.
Fei:
I’d be very happy to support with developing digital tools and platforms that either strengthen local communities or make education more accessible. Some projects/orgs that come to my mind are Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung, Too Good to Go, Betterplace.org, Khan Academy, Nebenan.de, The Breakfast App, Deutschlandfunk, ... Also, since I’m personally very passionate about arts and music, I’d be up for working on projects in those areas, for example with Museum Barberini, Berlinische Galerie, Komische Oper Berlin, Berlin Bühne... or something much smaller, more unconventional, niche or even obscure.
Harry:
I would be delighted to work with the WWF, Greenpeace, progressive journalism (e.g. ZEIT ONLINE, the taz, Krautreporter), PeTA, Lush, vegan clothing companies (e.g. Zeta Shoes) or vegan food companies (e.g. Veganz), Wikimedia, the FSF, the W3C, government tech that real people use and also teaming up with literally any other cooperative, union or the ICA itself! Nintendo would be ace, for some childhood nostalgia. Broadly speaking: More women-led/founded companies, as well as cultural/public institutions like museums, exhibitions, libraries, public transport (e.g. the BVG) or public broadcasting! Oh, and as a sci-fi and space nerd, working with NASA or ESA would be a dream come true.
Julia:
I'd love to work on editorial projects with forward-thinking media outlets like Good Impact, Investigate Europe, Correctiv. Also, I'd be thrilled to design a creative tool or an educational platform, a new identity or a website for a gallery (eg. C/O Berlin, Das Minsk), a type foundry, or a local library.
Know anyone working in the fields or at organisations/companies mentioned? We’d be eternally grateful for an introduction: hello@village.one is where you can reach us!