In 1925, the Leica I set photography free. Small enough to carry, fast enough to capture real moments on the move. It became the first camera that could truly capture the pulse of its time.

In 2025, Leica celebrates 100 years of that breakthrough under one motto: Leica – Witness to a Century.

Task

For a brand whose story is inseparable from the times it captured, the centenary deserved more than a temporary campaign page. It called for a lasting experience, designed to live on. Like a Leica.

Execution

We turned the anniversary motto 'Witness to a Century' into a promise to the public – brought to life as a digital experience in which every visitor becomes a witness themselves.

The interactive time-travel journey moves through world history and societal change, told through iconic imagery, archival treasures and the medium's most influential photographers. Visitors shape their own path with two ways to travel: Fast Forward for a narrative overview, Deep Dive to explore moments in depth. The sense of time travel comes from the choreographed interplay of photography, context, sound, video and motion – guiding focus, pace and emotion. All within a design language that moves with the times.

Result

The result is a digital collection of a hundred years of cultural memory – shaped into an exhibition-like experience that doesn’t exist like this in any museum, library, or online archive.

1,800+ curated photographs by 220+ photographers and 280+ background stories across 12 languages – publicly accessible and free of charge. An average visit duration of 7+ minutes underlines the outcome: it’s a timeline people don’t just browse – they visit.

Built not only to last, but to live on, it extends beyond the anniversary through installations in about 120 Leica Stores worldwide and the Leica Akademie, and through #LeicaWitness, inviting the community to keep witnessing the present – and turning a centenary into a lasting record of the zeitgeist.