A World of Walls
Award-winning special feature about walls that divide countries, territories and families around the world
June 2017
Folha de S.Paulo
Folha's Interactive Journalism team
Coding & Design
Folha's heavy-duty journalistic effort to tell the story about these physical barriers needed a high-quality website to display stunning photography, videomaking, and infographics.
With heavy focus on photography and video documentaries, 'A World of Walls' is an award-winning feature from Folha de S.Paulo. From it's summary:
A more and more interconnected world is raising walls and fences to keep out those it considers undesirable. The number of physical barriers that existed in 2001 was 17: the figure has presently jumped up to 70.
Some of them reinforce borders. Others divide the same population. Some seek to stop the refugee flow. Others hide poverty. Or fear. Or war. Or inequality. Or climate change.
Folha went to four different continents to uncover what - and who - lies behind them.
'A World of Walls' is available in Portuguese, English and Spanish
Awards
- Grande Prêmio Petrobras de Jornalismo 2018
- King of Spain prize - digital journalism
Otorgado por unanimidad a Patrícia Toledo de Campos Mello, de Brasil, por el trabajo «Un mundo de muros», publicado en la Folha de S.Paulo el 26 de junio de 2017. El jurado valora la buena factura del trabajo con un diseño muy atractivo y todos los contenidos -foto, vídeo 360º e infografías-, de una gran calidad y perfectamente integrados. El trabajo multimedia versa sobre la construcción de muros en distintos lugares del mundo y sus consecuencias en el día a día para emigrantes, refugiados, personas con menor poder adquisitivo y zonas afectadas por otros motivos.
- International Humanitary Coverage prize - Red Cross
- Grande Prêmio Folha 2017
- ÑH2017 - Society of News Design
Development
The main issues with this project was the heavy reliance on photography and video formats. We had to work around Folha's technology demands and develop a mosaic-esque scheme for the pictures — beautifully handpicked — and ways to display 360º and regular videos with different looks and impacts on performance.
Working together with editors, journalists and photographers, the digital team had a big part in mixing text, images and videos together, making a probable masterpiece in journalism.
Read more about the technical issues found in Folha's special features reporting in the Climate Crisis project.
* Cover photo by Lalo de Almeida/Folhapress