For its Holiday 2026 campaign, Prada taps into nostalgia and, unsurprisingly, hits all the right notes.
With “Drawing Prada. Animated by Hand,” the fashion house draws inspiration from the world of classic Disney films, bringing hand-drawn illustrations, fairytale settings and characters inhabiting impossible worlds back into the spotlight.
To bring this vision to life, Prada chose to the highly skilled hands of John Pomeroy, a veteran American animator who has worked on some of the most iconic animated films of all time, both for Disney and beyond, helping shape the childhood memories of generations.
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“I learned my craft with paper and pencil, through old-school, analogue drawing. We’ve stayed true to that approach, and we want to pass it on to future generations,” says Pomeroy. “Animation speaks into stories like live action can’t,” Pomeroy says. “It’s a whole different universe. There’s a very distinct and purposeful reason to do hand-drawn animation, and that’s to see that there’s value in the human touch. And that hand-drawn and handcrafted work is still alive in the world today.”
The handcrafted illustrations, overseen by John Pomeroy and his team of illustrators, meet the distinctive lens of renowned photographer Glen Luchford. Known for his unique perspective, Luchford captures images in which the subjects seem to move through painted sets, surrounded by wintry landscapes and whimsical animals.
Pomeroy’s team approached the storytelling process by developing the characters “from the inside out,” as he explains. In other words, they started by imagining the protagonists’ desires and whims: a Snow Lynx, for instance, gazing at an Avoir mini bag, or a group of mice utterly enchanted by a pair of black-and-white polka-dot shoes.
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The result is an advertising campaign that feels both surprising and familiar, blending scenes from real life with pencil-drawn settings to create a magical universe of sets and short films populated by some decidedly familiar faces.
Chinese singer and actress Chen Haoyu, British actor Luther Ford, American actor Kelvin Harrison Jr., and actresses Maya Hawke and Sadie Sink star in a series of visual stories that bring photography and animation together, evoking classic fairy tales and the allure of a bygone Hollywood era.
