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The making of Indoors Zine, a Dropbox collaboration combating creative isolation
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Parties for one and balcony behaviour: Indoors Zine with Dropbox illuminated how creatives stayed sane in lockdown.
During a difficult time for many in lockdown, Indoors Zine brought 20 creatives together to spread a little humour, empathy and fun – all through our partnership with Dropbox. With a combined campaign reach of over 2.45 million, the zine became one of our largest-reaching campaigns for Dropbox to date.
When Covid-19 forced creatives into working remotely, Dropbox approached It’s Nice That to help bring its audience some joy and relief. The zine was needed more than ever, and we worked alongside our network of creatives worldwide to turn this around in a matter of weeks. It was a huge reward for both It’s Nice That and Dropbox to create a sense of togetherness at a time when many felt most isolated.
The project was conceptualised, created and delivered at a time when most people's lives and jobs were being affected by the pandemic. In the creative industries in particular, commissions were drying up due to the ongoing uncertainty. Our top priority for the project was to get as many creatives involved as possible. “We were aware of the uncertainty within the industry at the time and therefore wanted to create the opportunity for as many paid commissions as possible. It was a priority to get as many people as we could involved in the zine and to create a space for both emerging and more established creatives to sit side by side,” says Will Knight, creative at It’s Nice That.
Kate Isobel Scott
“It was a priority to get as many people as we could involved in the zine and to create a space for both emerging and more established creatives to sit side by side.”
Will Knight, creative at It's Nice That
We wanted to visualise the effect Covid-19 was having on the creative community, as well as share some of the ways people were coping. To do this, we decided to create a publication about “the great indoors”.
“We were so sick of the barrage of self-improvement advice online at this point during the pandemic. It made you feel that if you weren’t using lockdown productively, then you were doing it wrong,” says Will. “We wanted to find a way to speak about and capture the shared experience of the time in a playful way that didn’t take itself too seriously – and to provide a bit of escapism too."
To do this we commissioned 20 creatives, who each created a piece of work for the zine using Dropbox Paper. Through the platform they were able to share ideas, sketches, updates, new stylistic tangents and, of course, their final artworks.
Kate Isobell Scott
Working with a diverse group of creatives was essential for the project to resonate with our global audience. We used our network to select a range of artists, from the up-and-coming to the established, hailing from 14 cities worldwide. With 11 illustrators, six graphic designers, four photographers and one animator collaborating virtually across the globe, the artworks in the zine reveal a colourful variety of isolation setups.
In one piece, Clarice Tudor shares her tips on how to hold an isolation party. “DON’T call your ex,” reads her comic strip creation. “DO invite all of your exes into one Zoom call.” Meanwhile, Tom Guilmard created a guide to balcony etiquette and Saehan Park shared a beautifully illustrated bibimbap recipe.
We published three articles to promote Indoors Zine. The first feature launched the project and asked creatives about the importance of keeping a routine during lockdown. In the end, the piece reassured readers that there’s no right or wrong way to create work during such an uncertain time.
The other two articles showcased Indoors Zine itself and encouraged readers to download the full publication via Dropbox. Each piece explored the 20 spreads and interviewed the collaborators about how they found working together in Dropbox Paper.
We used our Instagram, Twitter and Facebook presence to promote Indoors Zine to our audience, which accounts for an organic social reach of 2.4 million people. Our media campaign helped drive further traffic, with our social ads increasing article views by 54%.
Finally, the project proved so popular with the wider design community that it was featured on a number of news websites, including Cool Hunting, Design Taxi and Beach London.
- Total campaign reach of over 2.45 million people on It’s Nice That
- Highest performing social campaign It’s Nice That has ever produced for Dropbox, resulting in 4.8 million impressions
- More than 7,000 zine downloads
- 20 creatives commissioned from 14 global cities
Indoors Zine showed the industry that with the right tools, creatives can still collaborate and achieve amazing things while working remotely. “Working with Dropbox Paper (which we had never done before) was shockingly smooth!” say contributors Na Kim and June, from Panolo Blahnik. “We normally use Dropbox to share any files or content regarding Panolo, so its interface and functions felt pretty intuitive.”
And ultimately, bringing a sense of joy and togetherness to both the creatives on the project and our audience in lockdown meant a huge deal to us at It’s Nice That. “It’s always a pleasure to work with It’s Nice That and I’m forever grateful for the support you give us guys,” says contributing illustrator Tom Guilmard.
"The team deeply understands how to engage the creative community in a way that is supportive and also additive to culture, all the while showcasing the power of our products."
Head of brand marketing at Dropbox