Globally, an increasing recognition of the importance of ecosystem-based management (EBM), Indigenous resource management (IRM), and Indigenous-led research and management is emerging; yet, case studies within scholarly literature illustrating comprehensive application of these theories and philosophies are scarce. We present the collaborative management model for the Heʻeia National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR) as a contemporary Indigenous Community and Conserved Area (ICCA) that has synergistically operationalized these principles, as well as one that approaches research as a reciprocal collaboration with the Indigenous people and local community (IPLC) of place. The Heʻeia NERR was designated in 2017 through a process led by IPLC members in Hawaiʻi.