It’s another Sunday morning, coffee in hand, and I’m reflecting on yesterday. I spent the afternoon barefoot on a beach watching Cyprus’ First International Beach Rugby tournament in Limassol. This wasn’t where I expected my Love Our Island project to take me.
A year ago, if you’d suggested I’d be designing a beach-rugby-themed-anti-littering-but-in-a-positive-way banner, a bunch of stickers for bins too while enthusiastically filming a sport whose rules remain largely mysterious to me, I’d have politely called you mad. Yet there I was in the heart of Limassol’s beach front, on a hot day in early June, barefoot and pitch side with a group of sweaty, bruised, panting players throwing themselves into a game that looks like pure chaos… and I rather enjoyed it all.
One of the unexpected benefits and genuinely enjoyable parts of building a project is that it grants access to worlds you’d otherwise never visit. The obvious objective of partnering with the Beach Rugby event was to raise awareness about keeping our beaches clean and more broadly sharing the vision of loving and keeping our beautiful island of Cyprus clean. The less obvious benefit was everything else. Meeting people who recognised the project from social media and being able to connect with them in person. Hearing ideas, offers of support and making introductions that would never have happened sitting behind a laptop. And experiencing all of that (along with the fun of tournament itself) in a completely different setting to a conference, a zoom call or a board room.
And now I’m back at my desk in a setting thats much more familiar to me, editing the footage into a piece of social media content that is looking surprisingly good, if I do say so myself.
That’s the thing about partnerships. The best ones aren’t transactions, they’re multipliers. The event gained some additional visibility through my content and social media sharing and will benefit from the piece I’m editing for next years tournament and Love Our Island was introduced to a completely different audience and the message reached people who may never attend a cleanup or environmental event.
The banner I designed was a 2x1m waterproof piece installed directly on the pitch railing along the promenade, positioned so it naturally caught the attention of anyone passing by and instantly framed what was happening on the beach. It blended event visibility with a playful rugby pun while still keeping the environmental message: “Play hard. Keep it clean.”
Alongside the banner, we rolled out a small but impactful set of supporting touch points — custom stickers placed on bins around the event to encourage proper disposal, plus additional Love Our Island branding featured on flags, pitch-side banners and within the official tournament programme. Together, it created a consistent presence across the space, tying the sporting energy of the event to a simple reminder about protecting the island.
What was particularly encouraging was observing the players themselves. At the end of play, the athletes’ village and touchline areas were remarkably clean. Bins were used. Rubbish was picked up. People took responsibility for the space around them. It sounds like a small thing. But that’s exactly how cleaner beaches happen. Not through grand gestures but through a lot of small decisions made by ordinary people.
The more I work on Love Our Island, the more I realise the project isn’t just about litter. It’s about creating opportunities to meet different people, enter different worlds and spread the message in places you never expected. And sometimes that means spending your Saturday on a beach watching rugby.
Not a bad trade.
If you’re interested in being part of Love Our Island, send me a message. I’d love to hear from you.