Canva - Design with Pride

Campaign Date: 2023

Amplify + Canva celebrate self-expression through the power of visual communication for Sydney WorldPride...

Challenge

Develop and execute a creative platform to activate Canva’s sponsorship of Sydney WorldPride that drives usage of pride templates in Canva and increases social engagement.

Insight + Strategy

Design and creativity is a powerful way to express pride and show support. With historical roots in protesting, from Stonewall to Sydney Mardi Gras, these powerful gatherings have featured eclectic poster designs and creative performances which evoke the values and experiences of the LGBTQIA+ community.

To show meaningful support, our approach was to partner directly with some of the LGBTQIA+ community’s best creatives to deliver authentic, collaborative experiences that celebrate Canva as the world’s most inclusive visual communications platform.

Solution

Design with Pride

Positioning Canva as the design platform to create bold, impactful pieces for every WorldPride celebration. From marching in the parade to supporting from the crowd, partying around the city, and beyond – Canva empowers the community to share its message through creativity and design.

The Drag & Drop Print Shop at Fair Day

A pop-up print shop inspired by Canva’s easy-to-use interface that enabled festival attendees to design and print custom pride tote bags.
Revellers were welcomed by Print Shop managers, Indigenous Australian drag artist JoJo Zaho and Jack Huang from ballroom collective House of Silky, and invited to choose from a diverse range of templates, including designs from LGBTQIA+ creatives Amy Blue and Michael Sun. Guests could then share their creation with the world with social content.

Now considered best practice, The Drag & Drop Print Shop was the first solution globally for integrating the Canva platform into an onsite activation and is now used at other Canva activations worldwide.

Mardi Gras Parade

With the parade back on Oxford Street for the first time since the pandemic, Canvanauts showed up in full force and celebrated the community.

The float was a joyful and colourful collection of designs from the LGBTQIA+ community, filled with elements found on Canva by searching ‘Pride’ in the Canva library. Amy Blue and Michael Sun's Pride designs were integrated into the float, showcasing the stickers and elements they created in collaboration with Canva for Fair Day.

Canva founders Melanie, Cliff and Cameron were joined on the float by drag performer Domino Trixx, ballroom performers Taimania Foa'i and Eliam Royalness, as well as performance artist and costume designer Brendan de la Hay.

Along with the float, 80+ Canva employees performed a choreographed routine whilst carrying placards displaying designs created via an internal competition.

Pride Villages

Taking Canva to the streets to join the Pride Villages street party, capturing portraits of the final weekend's celebrations. Partnering with Drag Queen Timberlina to host a roaming photography activation, where attendees could have their photo taken, and printed out to customise with Pride stickers designed by Amy and Michael. With their consent, these images were added to the platform in the photo library as part of Canva’s goal to build the world’s most diverse content library.

Results

Canva’s WorldPride campaign positioned Canva as the design platform to create bold, impactful pieces for every type of WorldPride celebration.

From marching in the parade to supporting from the crowd, partying around the city, and beyond–Canva empowered new and existing users in the LGBTQIA+ community to share their messages through creativity and design.

1st Canva platform event integration globally

23,000 applications of 2023 pride templates on Canva

27% increase in publishes of pride templates and elements YOY

1,007 print shop attendees

763 tote bags designed

1,400 Pride Villages portraits taken

49 Portraits added to Canva library