Drawing Prada: Animated by Hand, Bringing Live-Action Actors into a Hand-Drawn Winter World

Drawing Prada: Animated by Hand is a series of short films for Prada’s Holiday 2026 campaign. Live-action photography and direction by Glen Luchford are combined with hand-drawn animation led by John

Prada’s Holiday 2026 campaign Drawing Prada: Animated by Hand is a series of short videos and images that layers live-action figures with hand-drawn animation on the same screen. Released on October 27, 2026, the campaign features Chen Haoyu, Luther Ford, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Maya Hawke, and Sadie Sink, with the actors entering a storybook winter setting of snow-covered forests and fireplaces.

At the center of the work is an illustration team led by animation director John Pomeroy. Rather than simply adding animation to background decorations, the team hand-draws animal characters and winter landscapes, using them as the environment itself for the live-action scenes. Characters such as foxes, mice, rabbits, and bats share the same space with the actors and Prada’s bags and shoes, connecting the real-world set with an imaginary world.

Glen Luchford handled the cinematography and direction. Prada explains that it matched the lighting and perspective to the lines and sense of space in the illustrations. As a result, the filmed actors do not merely appear to have been composited into a drawing; instead, the illustration functions as a stage that responds to the characters’ movements. Another feature of the campaign is that the still images and short videos share the same visual language.

A Campaign That Puts the Hand-Drawn Process Front and Center

The released making-of video highlights the traditional drawing process using pencils and paper. Pomeroy and the animators designed the characters’ movements and expressions frame by frame, then connected the results to the live-action shoot. The choice to make the texture of the lines and the production process visible, rather than relying on sleek digital effects, forms the visual identity of this holiday campaign.