Cannes Lions

Skins of Peace

TBWA\RAAD, Dubai / AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL / 2018

Awards:

1 Shortlisted Cannes Lions
Presentation Image
Supporting Images
Supporting Content

Overview

Entries

Credits

Overview

Description

With a tiny budget to tackle an enormous challenge, we had to come up with an idea so creative it could live on its own. If Islam was being misconstrued for being violent and Muslims were treated as a travel threat, merely claiming the opposite would’ve never sufficed. For our idea to be impactful, we needed evidence from the Islamic religion itself that could travel the world to spread the word when Muslims couldn’t.

The idea was powerfully simple: transform passports from a means for discrimination into a message of peace.

Accordingly, we looked into The Quran, Islam’s Holy Book, as the sole source and true bearer of the essence of this religion, for verses that relay tolerance and acceptance. These verses (in English) would be beautifully transformed into passport holders and would be known as the Skins of Peace.

Execution

Partnering with Facebook, we launched on Amnesty International’s social pages under #SkinsofPeace. This meant a series of content pieces ranging from explaining the situation to promoting the campaign and “how-to” tutorials. All the content drove people to the campaign website to entice downloads. Simultaneously, leather samples of the passport cover designs were sent to influencers to expand our message further.

We collated +700 A4 designs from 83 countries. These were a variety of Arabesque, modern, calligraphy, geometric and illustration styles. Working with world-renowned origami artist Robert Lang, we developed a painfully easy 4-step fold that turns any of them into sturdy passport covers. To generate more buzz and establish relevancy, we launched our campaign on December 18th, International Migrants Day. Over the span of 1 month, we released short format tutorials and posts to drive downloads. Offline, we made the passport covers available at travel agencies, airports and Islamic Centers.

Outcome

SkinsofPeace.com registered thousands of daily visitors. Content films recorded +45 million impressions and posts received a 120% higher engagement rate than any previous Amnesty International post. Design downloads to date exceeded 250,000 in 2 months. This was aided by the overwhelming global media exposure the idea received: Arabian Marketer, Creativity Online, Culture Pub, Ads of the World, Communicate, The Drum’s round-up for the most creative work and Campaign’s Top 30 Campaigns for 2017 to name a few helped garner international coverage in many languages to expose and mobilize even more people around this cause. Online listening reports registered more than 90% positive sentiment around the world. The Skins of Peace became so popular, we ended up producing larger quantities to be sold on Souq.com with the proceeds going to the “No Ban, No Wall” program. Most importantly however, we got our message of tolerance to the world: Islam is peace.

Similar Campaigns

12 items

Shortlisted Cannes Lions
Before Our Eyes

SHAPE HISTORY, London

Before Our Eyes

2024, AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

(opens in a new tab)