In 2010 at Twentysix we created a Movember themed website called Mo's Wanted. The site got thousands of visits throughout the month, but we realised that the only people donating to us were friends and family.
I wanted to create a site that would encourage donations from people we didn't know, but also help spread the word of Movember. I came up with the idea "Gallery of Mo". Every person who donated to our Movember Team would receive a free portrait (or Mo'trait) which would be lovingly illustrated with the addition of a moustache. Gallery of Mo was the perfect way none mo growers could take part in Movember and spread the message of Movembers great work.
I wanted to create a site that would encourage donations from people we didn't know, but also help spread the word of Movember. I came up with the idea "Gallery of Mo". Every person who donated to our Movember Team would receive a free portrait (or Mo'trait) which would be lovingly illustrated with the addition of a moustache. Gallery of Mo was the perfect way none mo growers could take part in Movember and spread the message of Movembers great work.
2011's Gallery of Mo design
The first Gallery of Mo was designed and built in one week. We weren't expecting a huge amount of traffic or portrait requests, and so we designed a site that was like a giant carousel...after the first week we realised this wasn't the best user experience.
Originally we were just going to have 4 designers from Twentysix illustrating the portraits. I then thought it'd be interesting to reach out to other artists to see if they'd like to participate. I was amazed by the response and managed to have artists such as McBess, Stan Chow, David Despau and Pat Perry join us.
2011 Results
Total Raised: £5081
Artists Signed Up: 20
Portrait Requests: 182
Page Views: 52,000`
Total Raised: £5081
Artists Signed Up: 20
Portrait Requests: 182
Page Views: 52,000`
Goodness Award - Digitally Leeds
Winner - Contagious Magazines Movember competition
Digital Award - Yorkshire Cream Awards
Chairmans Award - Yorkshire Cream Awards
Winner - Contagious Magazines Movember competition
Digital Award - Yorkshire Cream Awards
Chairmans Award - Yorkshire Cream Awards
2012's redesign
After the great success of 2011's Gallery of Mo, we were asked by Movember if we'd continue the site for 2012's Movember. They wanted to help us gain National recognition, along with us helping them with their many live events.
As we learnt from 2011's site, with only 20 artists we were limited to the number of portraits we could create. So mid 2012 we launched an "Artists we need you" campaign where we asked the artist community to help.
As we learnt from 2011's site, with only 20 artists we were limited to the number of portraits we could create. So mid 2012 we launched an "Artists we need you" campaign where we asked the artist community to help.
2011's website was also heavily labour intensive for myself as each portrait needed to be upload manually. For 2012's project I helped create an automated process that would make the donation process easy for the user, while artists quickly being able to access reference photos and upload their finished piece.
From being the most popular attraction at each Movember event to getting a tweet from Stephen Fry, 2012's site was a huge success.
2012 Results
Total Raised: £11,883
Artists Signed Up: 174
Portrait Requests: 599
Live Events: 10+
Total Raised: £11,883
Artists Signed Up: 174
Portrait Requests: 599
Live Events: 10+
Awards Won
BIMA 2013: Best Self Publicity
Drum Design Awards: Interactive Design
.Net Magazine: CSS Site of the Month
Some of the artists at the 2012 London Launch Party
2013 - Present
In 2013 Movember wanted to help us launch the project no just in the UK but also in the USA, German, France and Netherlands. To help us do this we tweaked the site slightly and improved the donation process to ensure everything was as smooth as possible.
As each year Movember rebrand their website we thought we’d do the same. For the branding in 2013 I wanted to create a very clean, vibrant, geometric style that would adapt well from digital to print.
2013 Results
Total Raised: £8,794
Artists Signed Up: 193
Portrait Requests: 623
Live Events: Too many to count!
Total Raised: £8,794
Artists Signed Up: 193
Portrait Requests: 623
Live Events: Too many to count!
Icon Set
Lazy loading homepage
Donation Process
Small section of the queue waiting for Mo'traits
In 2014 Gallery of Mo continued without me, and hopefully will continue to go on raising money for such a great cause.
Also in 2014 my illustration ended up on a HP sauce bottle! Pretty cool eh?
To date Gallery of Mo has been one of the projects I'm most proud of. It's amazing to think that an Idea I had on the bus has helped to raise over £25,000 for Men's Health Charities.
