AboutThe practitioner behind the work
Oana Maries — brand designer and strategist, portrait

Hello™

I'm Oana — I design how serious companies earn trust.

Brand Designer & Strategist
Fintech · Medtech · Civic Tech
8+ years of brand design
The storyHow I got here

Not a logo
person.

A deck —
A founder —
A turning point

Years ago, early in my practice, a tech founder brought me in to design his seed-round pitch deck — a few million dollars on the table. He knew exactly what he liked: he sent references, styles, colours. I was early enough in my career to say yes to all of it.

The design came out exactly as requested — and it didn't work. Polished, on-brief, and saying nothing to the only audience that mattered: the investors on the other side of the table. So the feedback started flowing in reverse. Instead of receiving notes, I was giving them — walking the founder back from his personal taste to the question underneath: what does this deck need to make investors believe?

We turned the whole direction around. He got the funding. And I stopped treating design as a matter of preference — mine or the client's. What a brand looks like is a message to a specific audience, sent on purpose. That's why I work with fintech, medtech and civic tech: industries where trust isn't a nice-to-have. It's the condition of entry.

Point of viewWhat I believe about branding

Convictions(3)

01Your taste might not be your audience's.Founders know their businesses deeply, and that insight shapes every project I take on. But what you like and what your audience needs to believe are two different questions — and a brand only works when it answers the second one, on purpose.
02Identities last as long as consistency does.The launch is the easy part. A brand earns trust when it shows up the same way, month after month — system respected, guidelines lived in, no drifting. Predictability is what turns a new face into a trusted one.
03Professionalism propagates.When a brand looks intentional and well made, people assume the work behind it is too. That perception spreads on its own — into credibility, partnerships, sales, positioning. Trust converts.
MethodThe thinking behind the thinking

How I work(4)

01 — BriefAlignment before aestheticsThe first conversation is the most important one. Before any visual direction, we align on what the work needs to achieve — what it should communicate, and to whom. Then you get a clear timeline, so you always know what happens next.
02 — ResearchPositioning & directionDepending on the project: positioning and strategy, or focused research into visual territories. Either way, conclusions are shared and discussed — there are follow-ups at every stage, never silence between milestones.
03 — ConceptsDirections, not guessesDesign starts at concept level — one to three distinct directions, each anchored in the brief. We discuss them together and choose the one that carries the message, not the one that flatters taste.
04 — DevelopmentFrom direction to systemThe chosen direction grows into the full identity — assets, applications, guidelines — shaped to the particular needs of each project, so the brand stays coherent long after handoff.
Working togetherWhat clients can count on

No surprises.

Good people you can actually rely on are rare — people who keep their word, keep you posted, follow up. I've built my practice around being one of them.

A timeline you can see
Meetings and updates are scheduled in advance, before the work starts — so you're never left wondering whether your designer will write back. If something shifts, you hear it from me first, in plain words.
Honesty, from the first call
Every engagement starts with a real conversation — a discovery call where we both take the pulse. If I don't agree with a direction, I say so, early and openly. I'd rather lose a project than nod along toward the wrong result.
A partnership of two experts
You know your business better than I ever will — your insight shapes the work. I bring the brand thinking. The decisions that matter, we take at the same table: you should feel the direction is right, not just approve it.
Resonance over persuasion
I choose to work with people I resonate with. The best work starts past the stage of proving roles — where neither of us spends energy convincing the other who's the expert, and all of it goes into the outcome we're after together.
Results you can point to
The shift shows up fast — from the first implementations, clients read as more professional, more premium, more intentional. And it compounds: one client raised their prices after we redesigned their site and identity, because the brand finally looked the part. Another walked into a seed round with a deck rebuilt around what investors needed to believe — and closed the funding.

"Working with Oana was a great experience for our company — a very challenging job with a tight schedule. Her deliverables were high standard, added great value, and showed a great deal of dedication. The result was astonishing."

Mahmoud— NorthMed
Off the clockThe person, briefly

Beyond the
artboard.

Off the clock, I'm usually in motion — at the gym, on a long walk, or recharging in a forest somewhere. I illustrate for the joy of it (occasionally it finds its way into client work), and I read widely: neuroscience, longevity, whatever AI did this week. Curiosity isn't something I practice. It's just how I'm built — and every brand I work on gets the benefit of it.

Start a project

Let's talk™

Taking on a small number of strategy & identity engagements. If you're launching, repositioning or scaling — let's talk.

hello@oanamaries.com →