One London tube station is filled with images of cats instead of ads
Tired of seeing the same old advertisements on food, clothing, gadgets, cars, and skin care wherever you look? Imagine what it would be like if billboard ads along EDSA featured our loyal feline friends? Or one of the Makati underpasses covered with cat posters instead of your usual ads?
One of the tube stations in London, Clapham Common, underwent a unique makeover. Since September 12, 68 ads were replaced by posters of stray cats whose images were from two shelters, Battersea Dogs & Cats Home and Cats Protection. This 2-week project, dubbed C.A.T.S. (Citizens Advertising Takeover Service), is an initiative of Glimpse, a group of creative individuals who want to use their skills to do something good. They aim to raise awareness among people about the numerous homeless cats in the city that need a home, and “…to inspire people to think differently about the world and realise they have the power to change it,” according to Glimpse founder, James Turner.
In order to make this campaign possible, they raised £23,000 to buy all the ad spaces in the station and replaced them with unbranded posters of cats. The team urged people to make a pledge: For every amount given, there is a corresponding reward such as a personalized postcard of your cat, a limited edition C.A.T.S. t-shirt, or your own cat featured in one of the posters at the station. Within thirty days of the campaign, they have reached their target of £23,131 from the 683 people who gave their pledges.
Whether you’re a cat-lover or not, you can’t deny that it is good to be surrounded by posters of these adorable cats instead of advertisements.