Jessica Adanich ('09 Sculpture + Expanded Media)
Jessica Adanich ‘09 lives by a simple philosophy: change perception, change behavior, change outcomes. As a brand architect, artist, and nonprofit founder, she builds brands and movements that shift how people see the world — and then how they act in it.
She found that calling at CIA. After her first year in automotive and industrial design, she switched to sculpture — the pivot that shaped everything since — and her BFA thesis, a soft-sculpture installation that reimagined sharks as cuddly, endangered creatures, was her first proof that art can change the way people see the ocean.
Today she carries that idea across three ventures: DesignPod Studio, her brand strategy and creative agency; Fuzzy Sharks, her line of educational ocean-conservation products; and the Sharkapalooza Foundation, the 501(c)(3) she founded, which produces one of the country’s fastest-growing ocean-conservation art festivals based in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Alum Advice
The nonprofit festival I founded and produce, bringing together artists, scientists, conservation organizations, and families around a single mission — changing the way people see sharks and the ocean. The 5th annual, at Coachman Park in Clearwater, drew roughly 2,000 attendees and 56 artists and mission-aligned nonprofits. (Collage of images from Sharkapalooza 2026.)
Credit: Founder, Creative Direction & Brand — brand strategy, identity, and all design assets by Jessica Adanich (Sharkapalooza Foundation).
My ocean-conservation product line, built on the biophilia principle: make a shark cute and approachable, and you open the door to caring about the real one. The plush pieces include an NFC chip in the mouth — scan it with a phone and it opens a site with shark conservation and education.
Credit: Product design & brand: Jessica Adanich / Fuzzy Sharks.
As the head of design and marketing for MACE, the personal-safety brand, I redesigned its product packaging — modernizing how a legacy category showed up on shelf. My packaging and design work there earned an international packaging design award.
Credit: Design & art direction: Jessica Adanich.