“More than us” is the Lavazza Calendar 2024

The project announces the 20th anniversary of our Foundation and promotes the concept of partnership in all its forms. Because “alone we go fast, but together we go further”.

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The Bantu word ubuntu signifies a particular vision of life. One translation of it is “living humanity through others”, a concept implying that you can only really be yourself through your neighbours or, to put it more simply, “I am because we are”. This typically African philosophy was the inspiration for “More than Us”, the new Lavazza Calendar 2024 that celebrates the value of collaboration between people, organisations and ideas in a photographic journey around the home continent of coffee. With their photographs, Kenyan Thandiwe Muriu, Nigerian Daniel Obasi and South African Aart Verrips promote a culture of sharing, co-operation and dialogue, one which grows out of the capacity to be open towards others. It is an approach that reflects the values promoted by the non-profit Giuseppe and Pericle Lavazza Foundation, whose 20th anniversary is celebrated by the new Calendar. Because it is in Africa – the home of the coffee plant, which once grew only in the Ethiopian region of Kafa – that the Foundation is carrying forward several of its 33 currently active sustainability projects.  

Each of the artists produced four photographs inspired by the Lavazza Foundation’s projects but also by Africa, a continent so diverse and so full of energy, experimentation and vitality. The result is a kaleidoscopic vision of reality that confirms the continent’s cultural richness and variety. This message also resonates through the involvement of three high-profile ambassadors who are staunch believers in the idea of collaboration, as expressed in “More than Us” and as shown by their commitment to social projects: Somali model and actress Waris Dirie, in the frontline against female genital mutilation; Nobel Prize winner Denis Mukwege, gynaecologist and founder of the Panzi Hospital in Bakavu, Democratic Republic of Congo, and a partner of the Lavazza Foundation; and activist Zulaikha Patel, a campaigner against racism in post-apartheid South Africa. Personalities from the worlds of photography and activism who are working together to promote the idea of partnership underpinning the project, by exploring the beauty of mutual contamination to create something bigger than they could alone: “More than Us”.