Responses by Poppy Jamieson, head of communications, Jelly London
Background: End Youth Homelessness (EYH) invited artists from Jelly London to express what home means to them individually, or what it might mean for a young person who does not have a place to call home. To raise awareness and help spread the word of the campaign, users shared their chosen artwork on their Instagram feed, along with the hashtag #HomeIsWhere. This artwork became a collection of five tees, which are being sold to help raise money for the charity’s new Housing Fund, which supports young people who are facing homelessness, into their own homes.
Reasoning: After getting in touch with EYH, we wanted to create a collective of artists who could come together to help tackle youth homelessness. Our artists at Jelly were excited when we presented them with the idea of collaborating with EYH, and using their creativity to make a difference to the lives of young people. We decided to create a T-shirt campaign with EYH, bringing together a group of five of our illustrators: Tishk Barzanji, Biff, Marylou Faure, Tom Guilmard and Hannah Warren.
Challenges: As with a lot of cases when creating pro-bono work, the most challenging aspect of the project was ensuring the artists found the time to create the artwork between their other paid work. With such differing styles between the artists, it was also a challenge to ensure that all of the artwork created was unified by the message of hope for homeless young people to turn their lives around.
Favorite details: I love that each artwork is so distinctive in style and characteristic of each artist. Tom and Hannah’s characters in their respective illustrations slobbing out and relaxing; Tishk’s signature dramatic lighting and architectural settings; Marylou’s oversized strong woman and Biff’s smiling house making home; all the illustrations seem so welcoming.
Specific demands: The only specific demands were the specifications for the T-shirt design. The designs had to have a much limited color palette than some of our artists were used to working with for printing reasons. This led to different artwork for both social and T-shirts being created.
Anything new: I learned a lot about homelessness during the project. Some statistics, which highlighted reasons for youth homelessness, particularly stuck with me. The most common reason, at 37 percent, was that parents were no longer willing to accommodate a young person. Then the following reason, at 15 percent, was that others were no longer willing to accommodate a young person. Then, another reason, at 12 percent, was the loss of rented accommodation due to termination of assured shorthold tenancy or some other reason.
Browse Projects
