After being sexually assaulted, most survivors shower and wash their clothes. However, in the process of washing their clothes, survivors unwittingly wash away DNA-evidence, making it hard for the investigation to find and convict the perpetrator.

The brief was to create maximum awareness with almost zero budget to make sure the maison blanche’s target audience, which consists of women and members of the queer community, know that they should not wash their clothes right after being sexually assaulted: to preserve as much DNA-evidence as possible; to empower survivors with knowledge; and to ultimately give survivors the confidence - by way of holding actual evidence - to come forward and report the crime.

The ongoing objective of the campaign is still to get as many fashion labels to include the Tags Against Crime in their collections to raise awareness and push the conversation forward.

«Do not wash if you’ve been sexually assaulted. » maison blanche placed these laundry instructions on a small yet powerful touchpoint: as anti-laundry-tags in clothing – thereby inventing the Tags Against Crime.

The Tags Against Crime will remind survivors of sexual assault to not wash their clothes to preserve DNA-evidence of the perpetrator.

The back of the Tag linked to a hub that contained more information for survivors and allies alike and offered the Tag as downloadable file to other fashion brands, so that they could include it in their collection.

While sexualized crime is a crisis that affects the whole world, it is women and the queer community especially who suffer from sexual attacks, a lack of empathy and a lack of justice.

To create maximum impact with zero media budget, the Tags were launched at the New York Fashion Week, to a global community and the international press. To create an impactful image that would go around the world, an almost larger-than-life sized Tag was printed and presented by an almost naked model – causing disruption and shutter clicks all around.

The approach was to place our message most effective on an individual level as laundry tags; then to incorporate them in collection that would be most effective in reaching the LGBTQIA+ community (maison blanche costumers); and to finally launch the collection at an event that would be impossible to ignore by the international press.

The Tags Against Crime were sewn into maison blanche’s DNA-inspired collection and launched at the New York Fashion Week to a global audience and the international press.

The tags linked to a website that contained more information: where to get help as survivors and how to support as allies. Partner NGOs offered additional support.

A downloadable tag was made available so that other brands could include it in their collections.

On Instagram, we posted facts and mobilized the community to spread awareness.

The press reported broadly about the anti-laundry tag and created awareness around the lack of survivor justice.

Only 2 weeks after the launch, we reached 14 millions media impressions and more internationally renowned fashion labels continue to reach out to include the anti-laundry-tags in their collections, to help push the conversation further.

Tags Against Crime garnered 14 million media impressions, which is an equivalent of 950’000 US Dollar worth in media value. With zero media budget spent.

maison blanche has further cemented their positioning as political anti-fashion brand and gotten the attention of a lot of audiences outside the fashion word.

Not only has the media reported about how to preserve evidence as an individual, but also on the low numbers of convictions of sexual criminals – pushing the conversation around survivor’s justice further. To this day, media requests to report about the Tags Against Crime are coming in.

More and more fashion brands are including the Tag in their collection.