How we built UNHCR Mexico's "Seamos Hogar" campaign from creative strategy to social media launch
Updated: 1 hour ago
UNHCR Mexico asked us to replace statistics with personal stories, and over almost a year we took the campaign from the first brief to launch day, with local crews filming in 7 locations and a library of 77 videos and 220 photographs as a result.
Mexico ranks among the ten countries receiving the most asylum applications in the world, with close to 80,000 new claims in 2024 according to UNHCR, and more than half of the people arriving say they fled violence, insecurity or threats. UNHCR Mexico wanted the public to meet the people behind those numbers, and it trusted our agency with the whole campaign.
One idea: "Seamos hogar"
We built the campaign on the conviction that integration depends on institutions and equally on the small gestures of neighbours, colleagues and strangers, which is summed up in the logline "a small gesture can be a refuge" and in the claim "Seamos hogar", or "let us be a home for those who cannot return to theirs".
A 360° journey in six steps
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Working with people who had to flee
Every protagonist left home because violence or persecution had put their lives at risk, which means that telling their story publicly carries a responsibility well beyond the technical side of a shoot. Safety and dignity shaped our way of producing. We began with listening rather than cameras, taking the time to build trust, explaining the process, agreeing on the questions with UNHCR in advance and informing every person of the outcome of the selection, whether positive or negative, so that those who appear on screen did so with a clear understanding of what taking part involved.
During two and a half months of intense pre-production, we got to know more than 30 stories of refugees. Many of them were very hard life stories that made us deeply aware of what they live through and face, and I was really moved to see how they move forward.
Andrea P. - Editorial and Production Supervisor - FACTSTORY LATAM
Stories told through belonging
Each film lasts about five minutes and travels from the intimate to the contextual, and from the past to the present, through identity, origin, the breaking point, arrival in Mexico, integration and a look towards the future, in a tone that moves the viewer while leaving room for hope and without ever reducing anyone to a victim.
To give eleven stories filmed by four crews the coherence of a single series, every crew replicated the same visual resources, beginning with a double-exposure portrait that superimposes each protagonist on the city where they now live, so that the city seems to enter the person while the person becomes a living part of the city. Each protagonist also showed the team an object kept as a keepsake from their home country, a small piece of memory that crossed borders with them and that the camera allowed to take its place in their new life.
Diego, 27, left El Salvador and now lives in Tapachula, where he sews at home, having learned the craft by his mother’s side as a child, and his sewing machine anchors his portrait. When he sums up what Mexico means to him, he says: “Mexico means hope, living again. Here, I feel at home.” In those few words, the idea that gave the campaign its name finds its most personal expression.
In Guadalajara, Greissy, a refugee from Venezuela, found in dance a way to express herself, to build community and to keep doing what she loves, and every class and every stage has become a space to share everything she has to offer. Her story shows that integration also means recognising the art, culture and life that each person carries from home, and it unfolds in a region of central Mexico that UNHCR describes as a reference for local integration, where authorities and employers have eased access to documentation, schooling, health services and formal jobs.
Local roots, global coordination
Led from our Montevideo office, the project relied on local producers and freelance crews who know the places, accents and codes of each community, which gives the films a cultural anchoring and helps to keep the carbon footprint of a seven-location shoot under control. Coordinating four crews in seven locations also required a shared audiovisual treatment and narrative structure, so that the eleven episodes feel like a single series with the same look, rhythm and voice.
UNHCR was very satisfied with the result. Before the premiere, they presented the campaign to colleagues and partners, and told us that many were moved to tears and that the campaign had achieved the impact they were looking for. The response was so positive that they asked us to continue the series, this time focusing on the government partners they work with to protect refugees. Our relationship with UNHCR is built on great trust. It is a pleasure to work with clients who trust our processes and approach, and from whom we have learned so much about this issue.
Andrea P. - Editorial and Production Supervisor - FACTSTORY LATAM
"Seamos Hogar", a campaign produced by FACTSTORY for UNHCR Mexico.
