The Zoo for charity CW+

This project was selected in the Digital – Experiential category in The Annual 2018, CR’s award scheme celebrating the best in commercial creativity

01/05/2018 12:18 am

CW+ is the charity for Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. Its arts programme transforms the patient environment and experience through visual and performing arts and creative participation.

The Zoo was created for the Children’s Emergency Department at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. Children visiting the Emergency Department are often anxious, distressed or experiencing pain. CW+ wanted to use a digital intervention to provide positive distraction, with the aim of reducing distress and perceived pain in patients and families.

The brief was to create a fun, engaging and universally appealing digital film which could play on a continuous loop, and which clinical staff could use to actively engage and distract children during assessment and treatment.

Filmmakers Accademia helped develop The Zoo, which features footage of 42 different animals, ranging from domestic to wild. London Aquarium, Colchester Zoo, Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, Battersea Park Children’s Zoo, and Hounslow Urban Farm partnered on the project. The film is displayed on 32-inch portrait screens in nine treatment rooms providing an intimate close-up of each creature, their expressions and features. As children can be in the department for many hours, The Zoo film is 90 minutes long on a seamless loop.