Maham Sohail, 21, started working as a freelance graphic designer around four years ago, with a clear mission in mind: not only be good at what you do, but use what you do for good. And in her nascent career she has managed to do just that and more. She caught our eye with her creative version of identity cards for pets.

Sohail describes these cards as a “way to humanise animals. It is almost like a statement that animals have rights too because sometimes it feels like people forget they are living beings especially when I see dog culling campaigns.”

This was not always the vision for them, however, as they started as a project even closer to her heart.

It started as a personal milestone of sorts for Casper, her cockatiel, who she bought from a pet shop. He still had some feathers to grow and did not know how to fly at the time. Sohail just knew she wanted to take the bird home. It was after Casper turned one that Sohail made him an ID card. “I said to him, now you are old enough to have an ID card,” she laughed. “The card was also a way to document how I was able to take care of him for a year,” she said.

The project, started as a celebration for the parrot’s clean bill of health, quickly became viral on social media and thus the animal identity cards were born. “The work was very personal to me so the response was unexpected. It was very wholesome to see how many people loved their pets so much that they wanted little reminders of them,” she said.

It was at the time when Sohail’s unique ID cards were going viral when Todd’s Welfare, an animal rescue and shelter in Lahore, was looking for donations. “It is important to do work that matters.” She contacted the shelter and asked to partner with them for a lucky draw based on the number of times people donate. “I made personalised cards for the winners; we ran the campaign for a month or so and I was able to help,” she said.

“Even with my freelance work, it is very important for me to choose brands that are making a positive impact in society,” Sohail said. The young graphic artist also regularly helps out at NGOs by working pro bono for them and was of the opinion the “design circle in Pakistan can do so, so much” to make a difference since it is not hard to “contribute [to society] or shed light on certain things through design, as it captures attention through visuals. The human attention span is shrinking and visuals really matter.”

When talking about her focus on helping people and causes, she said she does not sort causes by interest and wants to help wherever she can, as that is the mindset she has cultivated over the years, especially due to those around her.

“In ninth grade, I remember going to a bookstore in Lahore and being in awe of a poster hanging there. To my delight it was by a local artist called Shehzil Malik (@shehzilm). I went home and Googled all things Malik, I was a fan! I am fortunate enough to call her my friend now.”

Umair Abbasi (@umairabbasii), a university typography instructor, honed her skills for two years while also instilling a love in Sohail for all things typeface. “Then there are some people like @digink, who I actually only met through our work online and now we have become friends.”

Making each unique ID card takes her an hour from start to finish but before she can start designing the card, Sohail needs information of the pet in question. Think ‘B Form’ that you usually need for the very first Nadra issued CNIC, but the process is a bit simpler since you can just fill the form online and it needs no attestation.

“My manager Maryam (@_maryamhr ) does a lot of the proof reading for me just before the cards go to print, if she wasn’t around, I would send a lot of mistakes out. I could not do this without her,” she admitted.

When asked what is next for her, she said that she would like to expand on the identity cards for pets, where they become registered, with legitimate avenues to track your dog and later expand into microchips for animal collars and eventually microchips for pets, to prevent them from being stolen. “So many pets get stolen, but no one does anything,” the university-going artist lamented.