Latvia, a country with a population of two million people, was the last one in Europe to build a modern National Library. It took 200 million euros and 25 years to create the new building. During these years the project had suffered from changes in political agenda, an economic crisis and a postponed deadline – all of which lead to a severely damaged public image. How to cut through this negative clutter? With scissors.

It is common to reveal a new building by cutting the ribbon. We refused to let any politicians do this and instead made it accessible to everyone. Seven custom-made scissors were forged and seven celebrities from different fields invited to cut a piece of the 10 kilometres long ribbon.

They were then asked to choose any person in Latvia to pass the scissors to. The scissors were equipped with a switch and a bluetooth transmitter paired with a smartphone. A purpose-built app would record the time, location and add video of each participant online. A special website would show seven chains of events in seven different colours in real-time.

We drove 73,000 kilometres to reach 1,000 people in person including our country’s top celebrities. We generated an estimated 560,000 euros worth of coverage in media and the number of visitors to the new building increased by 72% including regions. We had managed to unite people with our symbolic act – to open the new library as a source of knowledge that belongs to everyone.

We started off with an online teaser that showed the hand craft of forging the scissors and introduced the idea of putting them into the arms of the public.

We then conducted a public event and invited seven celebrities from different fields to the new building to make the first cut. The seven chains continued for more than two months across the country. To reach a wider audience we enhanced the scissors digitally and by pairing them with a mobile phone made video content of each event instantly available on our landing page. There invited visitors to cut the digital ribbon and invite three of their friends as well.

According to our plan we also conducted a public photo exhibition next to the library by showing all of the participants and presented all of the scissors to the most popular Latvian museums during a live broadcast on national television.

During the two months we generated an estimated 560,000 euros worth of coverage in media and the number of visitors to the new building increased by 72% (from 148,256 in 2013 to 255,000 in 2014) including regions.

With support of the National Broadcasting Company unbiased interviews of the 1,000 people participating in the seven chains were broadcasted each day for two months. They told their story and relationship to the new library creating a credible source of positive transformation of public opinion. We held four press conferences revealing each stage of the campaign and received 80 additional editorial articles.

Overall, the library exceeded it’s plans for new subscribers by more than 28% during it’s first three months in the new building. We had managed to unite people with our symbolic act – to open the new library as a source of knowledge that belongs to everyone.