Love Your True Colors
To celebrate Pride month and honor the LGBTQIA+ community,
Ralph Lauren explores the story behind the rainbow flag.
The Campaign Story
It takes strength to be yourself
in a world designed to change you.
And it takes a rainbow to reveal
who you are to the world.
Join us as we proudly celebrate
the many stripes, the many people
who inspire us all to love our true colors.
The Approach
For more than 30+ years, Ralph Lauren has been a proud ally of the LGBTQIA+ community — supporting AIDs walks, the Stonewall Community Foundation, The Hetrick Martin Institute, and so much more. When my team and I were briefed to create a special #RLPride campaign, I felt honored to be included as several close people in my life are part of the community.
My partner, Reid, and I got to work. We wanted to hinge the campaign around the history of the rainbow flag, as most people do not know the meaning behind each of the stripes. And so, our campaign was born. Originally designed in 1978 by Gilbert Baker, each color in the flag represents an element of life that transcends identity—life, healing, sunlight, nature, serenity, and spirit. We chose to associate each stripe with a member of the LGBTQ+ community, allowing them to give voice to the meanings of the colors and how this energy is reflected in their own queer identity.
We felt strongly that our campaign should be captured by a photographer in the community. Iconic photographer, Cass Bird, contributed her talents as a photographer to create beautiful portraits of each cast member. In addition, she and her family also joined the cast, extending the Pride family to those who are family members of queer individuals. Needless to say, the campaign holds a special place in my heart.
“The primary home for our Pride campaign was on social platforms like Facebook and Instagram. Knowing social best practices indicate that video is prioritized by the algorithm, we maximized our campaign content to create a suite of video vignettes, one for each cast member and color of the flag.”
— Reid Rutledge, Art Director & Partner
To support the LGBTQ+ community, Ralph Lauren launched the gender neutral Pride Capsule Collection, benefitting our long standing partnership with the Stonewall Community Foundation. 100% of purchase price of the Polo shirt and 25% of purchase price of the rest of the capsule was donated to our global beneficiary, Stonewall Community Foundation.
