Toronto, February 28, 2024 – Global apparel retailer UNIQLO today 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 organisations.* These new items will be available from Friday, 15 March.

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 organisations 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 38 contributors (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 US$6.45 million using the February 20, 2024 exchange rate of $1=150.32 yen). 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)
Moomin valley 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 centred 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.

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 4, 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)
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.

 

33 Partners to Date

Akamai Technologies, Technology Company

Jonathan Anderson, Designer

Tadao Ando, Urbanist, Architect

Haruka Ayase, Actress

Jean-Michel Basquiat, Artist

Dick Bruna, Picture Book Author, Graphic Designer

Roger Federer, Professional Tennis Player

Ines de la Fressange, Model and designer

Keith Haring, Artist

Herzog & de Meuron, Architects

Ayumu Hirano, Professional Snowboarder, Skateboarder

Khaled Hosseini, Novelist

Rei Inamoto, Creative Director

Kosuke Kawamura, Collage Artist, Graphic Designer, Art Director

KAWS, Artist

Shingo Kunieda, Professional Wheelchair Tennis Player

Hakujyu Kuiseko, Calligrapher

Lisa Larson, Ceramicist

Christophe Lemaire, Designer

Christina de Middel, President of Magnum Photos

Daido Moriyama, Photographer

Moomin , Novels, Picture Books & Comics

Emmanuelle Moureaux, Architect, Artist, Designer

Haruki Murakami, Novelist

Yu Nagaba, Artist

Kei Nishikori, Professional Tennis Player

Julian Opie, Artist

PEANUTS, Comic

Jason Polan, Artist

Gordon Reid, Professional Wheelchair Tennis Player

Francesco Risso, Creative Director of Marni

Kashiwa Sato, Creative Director

Adam Scott, Professional Golfer

Hana Tajima, Designer

ULTRAMAN, Ultraman

Wim Wenders, Film Director

Shinya Yamanaka, Physician-Scientist

Takeshi Yoro, Anatomist

Media Contact

For additional information please contact Jessica Bryant, Head of Communications, Media and Public Relations:

647-973-1185

jbryant@savethechildren.ca

About Save the Children

Save the Children believes every child deserves a future. In Canada and around the world, we give children a healthy start in life, the opportunity to learn and protection from harm. We do whatever it takes for children – every day and in times of crisis – transforming their lives and the future we share.