The Second Wind Pirate Café is a personal passion project that began in 2014 with a simple idea: take my closest friends to Burning Man. I founded and organized the camp to create a coffee shop that only opens at night, from 9 PM until we feel like it. What started as a fun concept quickly revealed itself to be far more complex than I expected. It demanded not only my graphic design skills, but also strong management, logistics, environmental planning, living space coordination, storefront design, and mentoring. Ten years of producing and running the Second Wind Pirate Café have taught me how to build community from the ground up, lead with clarity under pressure, balance creativity with structure, and keep a team motivated while delivering a consistent experience in one of the most demanding environments imaginable.
Logo evolution
2018
2020
2023
2025
Our main offering is a coffee shop that opens at night. The bar I designed had to meet many requirements: it was to withstand the desert weather with its constant windstorms, and it had to be easy to construct and deconstruct, it had to be made from off-the-shelf materials readily available at any hardware store, it had to be sturdy enough to hold people standing on top of it, and many other minor details. The bar went through several iterations, starting as a simple wood counter to its current 360º metal form.
Store Front Design
2016 - 2017
2018 - 2019
2022 - 2023
2024 - 2025
Community Planning
Since 2014, the Café has evolved into what many campmates jokingly call a “traveling circus,” though a highly organized and efficient one. Every year brings new challenges and new opportunities to improve. I designed the camp to use modular shade structures that adapt to whatever space we’re assigned by the Burning Man Organization (the Borg).
2024 Layout
2023 Layout
Advertising
As much fun as our coffee shop was, it would be nothing if we dont’t have visitors, and Black Rock City has an average ot 70,000 citizens divided among hundreds of camps. Advertising was key, but the channels we had to promote the Second Wind Pirate Cafe were limited to the Burning Man Radio station, printed materials, and giveaways.
Second Wind Pirate Cafe | 60-second radio spot. Year 2022
Written by: Link Salas | V.O. Talent: Brant Barthle & Eliza Spear
Second Wind Pirate Cafe | 60-second radio spot. Year 2023
Written by: Link Salas | V.O. Talent: Eddie Mondress
Giveaways
Giveaways are a delicate matter at Burning Man, as these cannot become garbage (Material Out of Place); they have to be memorable, and they have to be reusable each year. I opted to create memorable stickers that would encourage our visitors to use them in their cups or other belongings. I came up with 27 different stickers that my pirates would hang out through Black Rock City, inviting visitors to our café.