A very different kind of photo exhibit is taking over a Toronto gallery next week, hosted by the Canadian women’s intimate wear brand Knix.
Toronto is the second stop for “Life After Birth,” which launched in New York last month. The exhibit features photos from 250 women, some of them famous (Amy Schumer, Jemima Kirke, Ricki Lake, Jillian Harris and Christy Turlington) but many not. The pictures are intimate moments of the postpartum experience that many women face but often don’t talk about. The exhibit is raw, natural and very real.
If you want to see what meaningful brand purpose and authenticity looks like in 2019, look at Knix. “Life After Birth” is a marketing initiative tied to the launch of the new Knix Leakproof Nursing Bra and maternity collection, but the exhibit speaks to the broader ethos at the core of the Knix brand and its founder, Joanna Griffiths.
Knix started as an underwear brand designed for the reality of women’s lives with leak proof underwear capable of containing urine, blood and sweat. But Knix has become about much more than the product. Since launching in 2013, Griffiths has built a community of real women sharing experience about their lives. It’s why Knix uses real customers rather than models in its marketing.
The idea for “Life After Birth” stems from Griffiths’ own postpartum experience. After giving birth in the spring, she felt frustrated by the unrealistic images of postpartum life and messages directed at women urging them to go on diets and work out to restore their pre-pregnancy body.
At the same time she was dealing with the common frustrations and challenges of breastfeeding. Griffiths felt like the postpartum narrative was at odds with her own experience and what Knix stood for (see the Instagram post below). Her idea was for a new message: “You are perfect as you, you are supported, and you are seen.”
Knix surveyed its own customers and found that more than 56% of women experience postpartum depression, 76% feel pressure to “bounce back” after giving birth, and 90% said people commented on their body after giving birth. The underlying objective of “Life After Birth” is to change the conversation so that postpartum women feel empowered and supported during a challenging time.
Some of the photos are user generated, while others were taken by birth photographer and doula Heather White. The project was produced through a partnership with Carriage House Birth and Empowered Birth Project. After Toronto, the “Life After Birth” exhibit will make stops in L.A., Austin, Dallas, Denver, Seattle, Portland, and Minneapolis.
