It wasn’t too long ago that we were deluged by think pieces bemoaning the state of dating apps; detailing their fall-from-favour in data that showed in cold hard numbers that their popularity had long since boomed. The swipe-laden online dating world, it seems, was drastically waning.

All sorts of theories flew around: maybe Gen Z – frequently (bafflingly, implausibly) lauded for its higher state of ethical consciousness – was seeking ‘authenticity’, the buzziest of buzzwords in recent times, and wanted to make ‘real life connections’.

Or maybe more jaded elder millennials were sick and tired of left-or-right decision-making, of letdowns, and of moves labelled with daft terms like ‘breadcrumbing’ (very Grimm Fairytales)’ and ‘benching’ (very fratboy jock). Perhaps it was the surge in bots, out there to lure in hapless hetero men, or the increasingly haphazard results that come from using AI in matching algorithms.

However, all that appears to be in the past now: over the last year, it’s more recent reporting on dating apps suggests things are very much back in business. The arguably most impersonal but best known app, Tinder, is still way out in front when it comes to the download charts (not so sick of the swipe then, eh?); but there’s also been a huge rise in more alternative/kinky/sex-jargon-packed apps like Feeld.

The long and short of it, though, is that most of us like to fuck, or – for the romantics out there – at least find some sort of connection to someone who wants to fuck us at some point.

As such, there’s still space in the online dating landscape for an app that helps us do those things; one that actually works really well, has a clearly defined USP, and looks good doing it. Enter, then, Cerca – a dating app that launched last year which promises to only connect people to people they already sort-of know. 

To me, that sounds like the antithesis of what you want from a dating app. It’s horrendous enough to see someone in real life (maybe at work, or a gymnastics class – and I speak from experience) who you’ve spotted on an app; let alone only being shown people who you’ve almost definitely met, since Cerca uses people’s contact books to ensure they’re matched with only people already within their social circles.

All that’s great for safety, of course – a key differentiator against the anonymity of competitor apps – since there’s a certain accountability that comes with dating people with whom you share friends or colleagues. The safety element likely explains the dominance of female-identifying early adopter users, as detailed in early Cerca stats.

But, and maybe this is the engrained maladroit Britishness in me, matching with acquaintances feels like some mad fresh hell – like an unnerving dream in which you’re inexplicably marrying your Uber driver in your primary school Year 3 classroom and your ex is the celebrant, or something. In short, it sounds potentially both surreal and excruciatingly awkward.

No matter what your personal take on Cerca’s approach to dating, we can probably all agree that brand design-wise, it’s doing brilliantly. That’s thanks to New York-based agency Saint-Urbain (Yoshi, Cob, Buena Fé), which worked across the app design, brand identity, animation, copywriting and strategy for Cerca.

As far as I can tell, the name already existed, which is a shame – I’d argue that Cerca is a terrible choice. It sounds like an energy company, or a fictional malignant ‘GlobalMegaCorps’-type operation as depicted in a Netflix dystopia, or perhaps a GCSE exam board à la Edexcel or AQA. ‘Cerca’ absolutely does not scream dating, or romance, or any form of hip new approach to these things – to me, it sounds absolutely the opposite.

But nae matter: once again Saint-Urbain has done such a superb job across the board that the brand tone of voice and visual identity does as much heavy lifting as the name alone – it’s so skilfilly done that you almost forget the whole thing is called ‘Cerca’ at all.

“In a crowded landscape dominated by anonymity and endless choice, Cerca needed a visual and verbal identity that communicated trust, clarity, and confidence,” says Saint-Urbain. “The challenge was to build a system that felt bold enough to live in public space while remaining human and emotionally resonant.”

During the strategy phase, the agency found that the majority of dating app brands “rely on softness, friendliness, or irony to feel approachable”. However, in Cerca’s case, Saint-Urbain felt that the product alone was so strong that there didn’t need to be any in-built persuasiveness.

“Dating through mutuals introduces trust, context, and accountability, qualities that are largely absent from the category,” the studio explains. “The opportunity was to express that idea with confidence rather than sentimentality. The brand needed to feel clear, assured, and human, not anonymous or algorithmic.”

Saint-Urbain achieved that by doing what it does best: centering bold typography, exercising restraint and deft use of negative space, peppering everything with some gorgeous illustrations and animations, and making everything just look effortlessly, breezily cool as fuck.

The agency opted to use Booton by Prague-based type foundry Displaay as the Cerca brand font, with some super tight spacing for the logo/wordmark that works brilliantly with the hulking chunky letterforms. 

On other pieces of copy, such as on posters and animations, Booton is used in a much lighter weight, and seems to have been given some added texture, lending Cerca’s snappy, to-the-point statements a nice graininess that again, seems to augment it all with that sense of humanity and grounding in the real world.

Cerca’s new look makes it as much as a lifestyle brand rooted in the physical, tangible real-world as much (or possibly even more) than it is a cold, digital app. The branding is seamlessly applied to merch – Gen Z faves like hats, millennial favourites like tote bags – it looks great on billboards and posters in the physical realm and online across the app itself, Instagram et al.

What works especially well here is how the fashion editorial-like approach to brand photography – which has the potential to veer a little too much into so-hip-it-becomes-aloof territory – is balanced out by some really charming illustrations and animations. 

There’s a suite of illustrated icons wrought in a charmingly basic way – just subtly textural simple linework that looks as if it’s been made with a big chunky Crayola crayon. This, again, gently adds a very human quality to Cerca – a sort of tactility that’s near-impossible to achieve in the app space, but done so well here.

Elsewhere, there’s a sweet Cerca character (not quite a mascot, but a ubiquitous entity) in the form of an amorphous sort of blob person, who veers from that faux-naif illustration style mentioned above to some very UVA-style digital marble patterning. The way he strides and morphs like a chameleon is both aesthetically very satisfying and just the right amount of silly.

The logo appears in various two-colour formats – stark black and white, a deep red against a gorgeous dusky pink; black on sugar paper-like pale green. These colours are used throughout the branding, and contrast flashes of ‘look at me’ vivaciousness with more muted, scurrying-into-the-backdrop-type hues. Even in the bright moments, however, this is resolutely a brand that never shouts – its inherent confidence in what it is and does is evident enough in the overarching Cerca voice.

This careful weighing of light-hearted playfulness and fashion-world-cool; of bold colour and pared-back layouts; of Shire-horse-heavy typography and pithy copywriting is evident and masterfully articulated throughout the entire identity. 

Whatever your take on the app itself, Saint-Urbain has done an exemplary job here in terms of articulating a razor smart strategy and visually manifesting it: you want Cerca, or something to do with it, before you even know what it is.