as the country celebrates pride month, we are really into equinox gym’s engagement of this celebration with their powered by pride campaign. through art activations, engagement philanthropy, and community partnerships, equinox aims to contribute to conversations around sexual identity and creation of safe spaces for all people.
the campaign began with a series of commissioned murals emblazoned with #poweredbypride, equinox called on their community to share photos of themselves with these murals (hashtagged, of course) and a little bit about what pride means to them. for each photo shared/tagged, equinox donates $1 to the Hetrick-Martin Institute and The Pillon Trust. in further celebration of the month, they released a short film, the lgbtqalphabet, which uses modern dance and graphics to shine a celebratory light on sexuality in both its fluidity and its freedom. it’s a beautiful mix of good design, interesting spaces, creative execution— but what sets this aside from all the other beautifully-designed campaigns out there?
we happen to think that the power of poweredbypride lies in the partnership they forged with nyc’s the center, an lgbtq advocacy group in new york. instead of striking out on their own to create this video, they made direct connections with the communities they were aiming to represent in a deliberate way. “We didn’t want it to be us dictating meaning around what these letters stood for,” says equinox’s executive creative director elizabeth nolan. “‘LGBTQA’ exists in the world and we all know what [the letters] mean. And then you have these other letters that we decided to give an interpretation of based on the insights of real people and what it means to them— this is not is Equinox saying this is what this means.” indeed, the dance interpretations of various ‘alphabet letters’ used to define modes of sexual identity in this video are extensions of conversations created between equinox and the center. that collaboration allowed for them to turn a risky topic into a genuine exploration and a celebration that feels neither contrived, nor salesy.
“learn to speak pride.” that is just one of the many slogans found throughout the campaign. through their exploration of the acronym, they hone in on our collective use of language to define statements of identity that are until now, almost too fluid to be definable. indeed, in their words, “six letters will never be enough.” ultimately, this campaign is a classic example of ‘walking the talk’— equinox committed to something, as they direct their audience to do, and they did it the right way. so, we want to give them some props for that.
happy pride, everyone! and check out the lgbtqalphabet below.