Polestar has released a new global brand campaign featuring former US astronaut Dr Karen Nyberg and her reflections on earth from space known as ‘the overview effect’.
The campaign portrays Nyberg’s life-altering experience of looking back at Earth from space. This becomes the narrative, highlighting the Polestar brand’s commitment to sustainable design and innovation.
Nyberg has two space missions and a total of 180 days in space to her name. In 2013, she spent nearly six months on the International Space Station (ISS) as a flight engineer.
The film draws on Nyberg’s reflection on the way humans live, the innovations and progress mankind has made, but also on the damage some of those advancements have had on earth. These questions arose as Nyberg experienced a phenomenon known as ‘the overview effect’, while observing Earth from above.
“When you look down on Earth you realise how fragile it is. It’s hanging there in the blackness of space with nothing around it. And it’s our only home, and we really need to protect it. For me, another aspect of the overview effect is that all humans are connected, that we have more in common than we think,” Nyberg says.
The Polestar brand says it believes in being part of the solution, that progress should not come at the expense of the environment, and that good design drives sustainable innovation.
Polestar says it has put itself forward in the automotive industry as the only manufacturer to publish the complete Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of the Polestar 2 electric performance fastback, with full transparency on methodology, and calls on the automotive industry to follow suit.
The environmental impact of its cars is displayed in retail locations and during the online purchasing process, and the company uses blockchain to trace the cobalt that goes into its vehicle batteries, a scope that will be expanded to include all risk minerals.
Recognising that electrification is a starting point, not the end game, Polestar earlier this year announced the Polestar 0 project, a goal of creating a truly climate neutral car by 2030, by reducing emissions throughout supply chain and production.
The brand campaign launched on October 22 and will run across key markets globally during the coming months, both in traditional and social media channels.
The campaign is collaboration between Polestar and global creative collective Forsman & Bodenfors. The campaign film was shot in Sweden, on the island of Gotland and in Stockholm. For the creatives Nyberg’s personal story was a big inspiration.
“We were very drawn to the ‘overview effect’ and how this phenomenon changed Karen’s outlook on life. We wanted to capture the empathy she developed for our planet but also how technology can help us embrace life, both today and in the future. Her story became the lead act in the film and gave us the unique angle we needed to reflect a brand like Polestar,” says Hampus Elfström, creative at Forsman & Bodenfors in Gothenburg, Sweden.
