The Snapshots from the Borders project aims to stimulate European, national and local policy-makers’ critical understanding of the global interdependencies that determine migration flows towards European borders. In particular, the project envisages the creation of a Border Towns and Islands Network, i.e. a network of cities directly involved in the migration phenomenon both to strengthen their cooperation and to bring a common voice to national and European institutions calling for a joint responsibility for the reception and integration of migrants.
For Snapshots from the Borders Lai-momo developed the graphic concept and created the visual identity of the project. In doing so, we drew on the concepts of ‘telling’ and ‘sharing’ that underpin the project. In fact, the S shape of the project title recalls the tortuous path of migrants and the narrative flow that makes us retrace their journey. The circles represent the project partners and suggest the idea of movement, journey, path. The colours also take on a meaning of their own, representing in particular the three bases of the project: campaigning, awareness and advocacy.
The identity is then declined in the promotional materials, such as flyers, roll-ups, folders, and in the visual content of social media.
Lai-momo also developed the project website following the basic rules of User Experience. The apparent simplicity of the interface also hides an articulated navigation path, necessary to show multimedia, through videos and images, and storytelling, with news and reports.
The site also gives partners the opportunity to publish initiatives in their territory. To facilitate this process, we chose to use WordPress as the CMS because it is user-friendly, free and widely used. In this way, the back-end is versatile and intuitive, and each partner can easily add and edit its own pages in complete autonomy.
Through an interactive map of Europe, users also connect to a mini-site, in the language of the selected partner, and can then access information on the individual, read an abstract of the project and deepen their knowledge with the latest news, reports and videos.
In addition to providing coordination and communication support and developing the website, coop. Lai-momo works in close liaison with the municipality of Lampedusa, the project leader. It was precisely on the Mediterranean island that, on 3 October 2019, a delegation of the cooperative took part in the celebrations of the Day of Memory and Reception and was part of the delegation of the Municipality of Lampedusa that participated in the Majoral forum on Migration in Marrakech (December 2018) and Quito (January 2020).
Finally, as part of the project, the Border Towns and Islands Network (BTIN) was inaugurated, a network formed by the local administrations of seven European border towns for cooperation and mutual support, the sharing of practices and to bring the demands of Europe’s borders to other citizens and institutions. The BTIN Association Memorandum was signed in Malta on 18 December 2019.
www.snapshotsfromtheborders.eu
Duration: October 2017 – October 2020
Funding: European Commission