Recognized globally for their color expertise, PANTONE Color Institute continually reviews the color names in their palettes to make sure they properly resonate with the times. However, we noticed they had missed one name, which was outdated and exclusionary – a beige color chip named Nude.

With a proactive approach, we challenged PANTONE and came up with the idea to create a campaign that would aid them on their mission. The timing of the proposal was perfect: the campaign ended up promoting PANTONE’s newly updated SkinTone Guide, helping customers across fashion, beauty and design industries represent diverse and inclusive skin tones.

The overarching objective was to empower and enlighten people with the true meaning of the word nude – a color of, for example, a piece of clothing that resembles that of the wearer’s skin.

Our goal was to empower and enlighten each other with the true meaning of the word nude, and all it took was a simple renaming of a color chip from Nude to Peach Taffy. This powerful action by PANTONE was followed by a series of beautiful portraits and behind-the-scenes footage of six individuals – each confident in their own skin. We shot the portraits using a stripped-down studio environment and a soft light to really bring out each person’s unique features.

This is nude – a line that would both catch people’s attention and celebrate the beautiful differences, making nude the most inclusive color in the world.

The imagery was highlighted as part of the launch of the special edition PANTONE SkinTone Guide, which has been expanded to include a total of 138 diverse shades of nude, all sampled from real people.

The way we use a single word can have a big impact on the world we live in. Nude (Latin nudus – naked, plain) has long been a loaded term. It’s not just a single beige-hued color. It stands for a variety of shades of, for example, a piece of clothing that resembles that of the wearer’s skin, making it something very personal. This is nude celebrates people of the world – no matter their personal color code.

Capitalizing on the public discussion on skin, nude, and representation industry-wide, the core target audience was professionals using PANTONE’s color palettes ranging from fashion to beauty industries. The goal was also to go beyond that to everyone whose version of nude is underrepresented. To make that happen, the assets were created and distributed to gain the attention of industry experts to everyone whose skin doesn’t match how nude is typically seen.

The execution included two parts: capitalizing on PANTONE’s industry position and online and social media platforms, and other industry media approaches. PANTONE ignited the topic and conversation in their channels. This was then followed by other industry online media and outlets, who published news and joined the conversation based on the assets that were pitched and distributed to them beforehand. The media were offered a set of campaign images joined with video interviews of individuals discussing their relationship with the color nude. The campaign was first launched in May 2023 and continued through to Autumn 2023. From a small, yet, significant name change of a color, the campaign gained attraction across the globe in industry online media and publications. With a media spend of zero, over 4 million people were reached.

- PANTONE shared the campaign on Instagram (3.6M followers), linking to the campaign article on pantone.com

- The article starred in Viewpoint Color design magazine as a double-page spread, both digital and printed version

- And received industry press mentions (Marketing Interactive, LBB)

- ‘This is Nude’ helped launch and sell the newly expanded PANTONE SkinTone Guide with 28 new shades, making it a total of 138 – all sampled from volunteers around the world in order to successfully represent the full spectrum of human skin types

- All in all the campaign was a remarkable way to elevate a single product – with zero media spend and a very limited budget