MANILA, PHILIPPINES — Global apparel retailer UNIQLO announces the worldwide release of five new designs for its ongoing PEACE FOR ALL charity T-shirt project. The project features T-shirts with designs expressing a wish for peace, provided by volunteer collaborators with close ties to UNIQLO. All profits from PEACE FOR ALL T-shirt sales are donated to international humanitarian organizations.* These new items will be available from Friday, March 15, 2024.
The newest PEACE FOR ALL collection features five fresh, playful designs from an eclectic group of contributors.
- Beloved Finnish character Moomin appears on a pink T-shirt, actively painting the word “PEACE” with a brush.
- Japanese anatomist Takeshi Yoro, author of best-selling book Baka no Kabe (“The Wall of Fools”), whose design features a photo of his much-loved cat Maru accompanied by the phrase ‘Hope means we can change.’
- The late, great New York artist Jason Polan, whose cheeky illustration pops out from the pocket of the T-shirt.
- Legendary calligrapher Hakujyu Kuiseko, with a striking design and Japanese text that reads “If you expand the circle, it’s a world. If you shrink it, it’s an ego.”
- Afghan-born American novelist, once a refugee himself and now a Goodwill Ambassador for UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, Khaled Hosseini, author of the bestseller The Kite Runner, whose elegant design states that “Peace is our highest good.”
* UNIQLO parent company Fast Retailing contributes 100% of profits from the sale of PEACE FOR ALL T-shirts (equivalent to 20% of the selling price) to three international aid organizations providing humanitarian assistance to people impacted by poverty, discrimination, violence, and conflict. Donations are made equally to UNHCR (the UN refugee agency), Save the Children, and Plan International through their representatives in Japan.
Donations surpass 970 million yen
UNIQLO launched the PEACE FOR ALL project on June 17, 2022, and to date has featured designs from 36 contributors locally (including this most recent collection). As of the end of January 2024, more than 3.2 million T-shirts have been sold worldwide, raising more than JPY 970 million (equivalent to approximately PHP 361.9 million using the February 28, 2024 exchange rate of PHP 1 = JPY 2.68). Donations from the PEACE FOR ALL project have been used to support various charitable projects, including emergency humanitarian assistance to protect the lives of displaced people around the world, ensuring children around the world impacted by conflict and disaster to be protected from harm, and helping to prevent early marriage.
New PEACE FOR ALL partners
- Moomin (Novels, Picture Books & Comics) Moominvalley is a valley of peace. Tove Jansson, the creator of the Moomins, was an ardent pacifist, and in her Moomin stories she created a utopia centered around the welcoming and tolerant Moomin family. The stories feature a diverse set of characters, each valued for their unique qualities. Despite, or maybe because of their differences they all manage to peacefully coexist with each other. ©Moomin CharactersTM
- Takeshi Yoro (Anatomist) Focusing on peace makes perfect sense. With so much of the world looking for peace, how can it be any other way? This T-shirt is a tribute to my late cat, Maru. When a stray cat took its food, Maru didn’t get upset until a minute after the other cat was gone. A cat who could not fight. Though perhaps that’s for the best. The time has come to give peace our undivided attention.
- Jason Polan (Artist) Stronger Together was drawn on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on January 21, 2017. It is part of Every Person in New York, a project that Jason Polan began on September 04, 2008, and which was later compiled into two books: Every Person in New York and Every Person in New York, Volume 2. Jason drew people he saw every day, and each night he scanned the drawings, uploading them to his blog. Jason knew he could never finish this project and was totally okay with that. He liked the idea that it would be a project he could work on forever.
- Hakujyu Kuiseko (Calligrapher) Stand on the ground and draw a circle around you. If you make it bigger, it will stretch out into the universe, and if you go smaller, it will home in on the self. A circle drawn in one stroke tells you things about your life, about the state of your heart. At the core, our hearts are pure, untainted and free. What do you see?
- Khaled Hosseini (Novelist) shared, “I grew up flying kites in pre-war Afghanistan and always associate them in my mind with peace. My design is a reminder that we are at our best when we approach one another with dignity and resolve our differences through mutual understanding and respect.”
