We wanted to show how young people hide their feelings of depression. Even though someone may seem happy on the outside, the truth may be that they are having suicidal thoughts. Our idea was to show these two contrasting sides in one execution.

We created 3 double-sided posters embroidered in fabric. Each was produced using an industrial digital embroidery machine.

The front side of each poster featured a typical selfie of a happy young person – framed to look like a social media post. The thread of the embroidery was expertly woven to give the portrait a beautiful texture, bringing to life features like skin, hair and eyes.

The back side of each poster showed the same image in reverse. But this time the portrait appeared a jumbled mess, with loose threads unravelling off it. This side represented the real ‘hidden’ depressed side of our subjects.

The campaign attracted local media attention and started positive online conversations about The Samaritans, boosting overall awareness.