Welcome to my ongoing archive of projects, experiments, and collaborations.
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This site is organized as a chronological database where each entry represents a piece of my evolving practice at the intersection of design, strategy, storytelling, and cultural research. Projects range from physical artifacts to organizational tools, from editorial writing to speculative futures. Some are polished outputs, others are works in progress. All of them reflect a curiosity for systems, culture, and human experience.

I’m Andrea Brena, a designer, strategist, and cultural researcher working across industries, disciplines, and communities.

My practice is driven by an enduring curiosity for how systems shape behavior, how stories influence belonging, and how design can enable participation at every level.

Currently, I lead the adidas MakerLab, a creative platform that fosters innovation and internal culture through prototyping, storytelling, and learning-by-doing.

From running programs for 2,000+ internal participants to curating exhibitions and producing editorial content, my work centers on empowerment through engagement.

Beyond the workplace, I explore themes of tourism, technology, and territoriality. I am exploring how to collaboratively imagine more regenerative approaches to tourism and development with entities and communities.

I document my thoughts in Hotpot, a personal blog investigating the cultural shifts that shape our connected lives—from memes to metrics, rituals to routines.

This site is not a portfolio. It’s a living archive of everything I make, research, and cultivate.
Every project is a different piece of a big puzzle. All are part of the same inquiry.
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Hotpot is a blog exploring the cultural shifts shaping our world—where digital and physical spaces meet, and where stories decode our complex, connected lives. My inquiry dives into the impact of technology on our behaviors, offering a personal perspective on cultural dynamics.

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Enhancing Employee Experience:
MakerLab and SUPSI's Innovative Collaboration
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Project Overview
The partnership between MakerLab and the Interaction Design Master Course at SUPSI aims to leverage technology for designing "intelligent" employee experiences. This collaboration focuses on co-designing innovative solutions to enhance employee engagement and onboarding processes.
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Key Actions
Co-Design Contract Agreement: Establishing a formal collaboration with SUPSI.
Identify Exploration Topic: Focusing on employee experience enhancement.
Briefing Development: Collaborating with a SUPSI mentor to create a briefing for students, emphasizing onboarding and long-term employee engagement.
Employee Involvement: Coordinating participation of adidas employees and the employee experience team as interviewees and mentors for student groups.
Design Mentorship: Guiding all student groups on design methodologies and processes.
Project Review: Evaluating the projects developed by the students.
Internal Promotion: Promoting the project within adidas to highlight the innovative collaboration.
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Results
The collaboration led to four insightful presentations—two on onboarding and two on long-term engagement. These presentations introduced a refreshing approach to HR technologies and overall employee experience practices. Students used adidas as an archetype to create a fictional use case, culminating in working UX/UI prototypes through a rigorous 7-week service design program.While university collaborations are common, the unique involvement of employees in this process was highly appreciated by both participants and the broader community.
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Report Password: dirtyword04

Project: "Dirty Words" Report Series
"Dirty Words" is a series of insightful reports that delve into themes and buzzwords which, due to their widespread use, have lost their original meaning. Through critical inquiry, these reports guide readers on a reflective journey, uncovering key insights and opportunities paired with practical advice.

About Dirty Words Report #4 [COMMUNITY]
The Dirty Words Report #4 [COMMUNITY] marks a significant collaboration between Protein Agency and Protein Community, both ventures of Protein Ltd. This collaboration explores innovative models of co-creation and value distribution.

Actions Taken:
- Report Proposal and Playbook: Drafted to define the collaborative dynamics between a consulting agency and a decentralized community, including the compensation model.
- Organisational Model: Designed to streamline the production of the report.
- Workshops: Planned, co-hosted, and reviewed various workshops focusing on: - Onboarding and Operations
- Editorial and Research
- Marketing and Sales
- Design and Creative Direction

Results:
Successful Report Launch: Introduced new creation and value distribution models.
NFT Collectable: The report was launched as an NFT collectable with embedded royalties, automatically distributed to contributors based on their role, contribution, and involvement.
Workshop Platform: The report has evolved into a platform for Protein Community workshops, hosted in New York and London.
Redefining Community: The report outlines a new, evolving definition of community that values belonging and co-ownership.

How to create a laboratory for exploration
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Adidas MakerLab Book #6 2022
Digital Print - Soft Cover - 300 pages 120g/m2 - 100 copies
Copy, Photography, Layout Design by me
Contributions from MakerLab team and Adidas Community

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The Human Upgrades Movement is a research hub at Elisava University of Design in Barcelona in collaboration with the Adidas MakerLab.
The program invites multidisciplinary design students (product design and engineering / graphics) to explore speculative futures that are defined by technology and its influence on human behaviour, perception, and potential.

For the second year, I am humbled to be co-mentoring two students in their graduation semester.

An overview of the projects can be read (in Spanish) on Neo2 magazine.

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Essays:
Co-author of Season 4: A future defining season
Co-author of Season 5: New adventure, new approach, new opportunities.
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Proposals: 
Season 5: A collaborative Report framework
Season 4: Our very own merge

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The Self-Regulation framework marked the first governance exploration for Protein DAO.

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The Connection Lab is a peer-to-peer learning network that aims at unveiling the untapped potential of employees at adidas fostering individual, professional, and collective growth.
Cultivating collecting knowledge and fostering emergence can help members of an organization discover one another and forge strong relationships rooted in mutual learning.

The network counts more than 850 members that are enabled to: 
- Host and attend learning event
- Explore collaboratively by joining focus groups‍‍

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Route In - A newsletter about walking and photography
Lockdowns have allowed me to consolidate a daily routine that made me reconnect with myself and my surrunding.
Taking long walks before or after work, exploring repetively the ordinary, has taught me to grasp and celebrate the nuances of the relationship between time and space.
Creating a Newsletter, is act of conscious rebellion against social media usage, consciousness from both sender and receiver, a more suitable way to create a platform for expression.
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The Human Upgrades Movement
The Human Upgrade Movement (THUM) is a research-based project developed between ELISAVA School of Design and Engineering and Adidas MakerLab. For the students, it represents the most important project of their academic career as it represents the culmination of their design and engineering training.
THUM aims to explore new paradigms for digital and functional identities, as well as identity ambiguity, multiplicity, and fluidity.
The Human Upgrade movement is based on a research venue proposed by Saúl Baeza and Oscar Tomico,researchers at “Future Everyday” Research group (Eindhoven University of Technology) and “FuturesNow” Research group (Elisava Research).

I mentored 2 of the 6 students in the program:
Graphic Designer Aina Martí
Product designer and engineer Laia Moras Visa
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Adidas 4D FWD
In 2020, I partenered up with Clara Dooley, Sr. Manager Brand Communications Retail Running, to work on the Adidas 4D FWD retail activation. My main contribution has been consulting both Adidas Brand Comms Retail and the Retail Agency on how to ideate experiences for a story rooted both in technology and a specific communication narrative "Designed to move you forward".
The input provided defined the overall approach to experience journeys, installations, and retail executions.
Pictures will be available soon.
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Linked above is the video produced by the agency Amplify.
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Adidas Ultraboost 21 Retail Activation
Back in 2018, I partenered up with Clara Dooley, Sr. Manager Brand Communications Retail Running, to work on the Ultraboost 21 retail activation. My main contribution has been to introduce an experiental approach to "high energy return" through senses. After introducing the work of Sissel Tolaas and facilitating the connection with her, a sensorial experience was embedded in the retail experience, releasing an artificial molecule that resembles the scent of the earth.
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In the video there is the Ultraboost product campaign video.
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Adidas boost re-branding explorations through digital crafts.
Collaboration with adidas Brand Design Identity:
Wordmark designed by Luis Callegari
Fabrication and photography by me

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Makerlab year book N.4 / 2020
300 pages - Editorial + interviews with 15 adidas employees
Digital print soft cover - 50 copies - Digital interactive version
Designed and edited by me
Contributions from the MakerLab global team and the Adidas community
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Graphics generated in Rhino - Grasshopper
Personal ongoing research.
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Johannes Itten square generator
Programmed in P5.JS this basic software allows the user to randomly generate color combination while controlling the proportions of all the squares.
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Physical & Digital Craft
Birifringent materials, lasercutting and polarized light.
Lasercutting and EVA foam
Lasercutting and heat-sensitive paper

A framework for a chronological archive of projects

‍This website aims at being a timeless destination to host my on-going process. As my interests expand in different disciplines, it was important to be able to identify projects and category in a chronological timeline, valueing my overall process and evolution rather than each single project or exploration.

By hovering on each headline an image preview appears on the left columnn.
By clicking a drop down section opens up revealing media such as text, images, and videos.
Rest your eyes, consume less, with dark mode.
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The website is designed in Webflow and inspired by the work of Joost Grootens.

Informing and inspiring the adidas community through exhibitions
DIGITAL MATTER_S strives to bring clarity and light on the crossover between digital and physical creation. The exhibition is a showcase of the work of some of the most talented 3D designers in Adidas, and an overview of learning and upskilling opportunities within the company.

Film production in collaboration with MotionBakery

Film narrative
What makes us who we are? What makes each and every one of us so unique and special?
Our daily life is an ever-evolving adventure.
We are in constant transformation, defining the pace of culture, reshaping ourselves, employing new forms of expression, defining new directions.
But we really see what makes us unique when we view ourselves in relation to others.
We look for partnerships, complementary ideas and matching visions.
We form relationships.
We look for that link that bonds us, driving us towards something new.
We start to see ourselves through the eyes of others and we begin to question our status quo.
We thrive in communities based on our shared values, but also on those individual differences that create unexpected creative collisions.
We are empowered by our collective mindset consisting of unique parts.  
We create, we share, and we connect.
The world is just one click away from us.
We are makers and doers.
Exploring that area between the digital and the physical world, between code and matter.
We benefit from the best of both.
By EMPOWERING, INSPIRING and CONNECTING, we’re shaping our environment.
We’re getting better, every single day. We’re driving positive change.We are who we are both through the lens of the individual and the collective.
We accomplish the unthinkable as we travel from one idea to a shared, embraced mission.

Special thanks to Shaba Mosheni for the copy editing support

Engaging with the Adidas creative community through workshops and a exhibition
30 Participants and a 4 hours workshop in the adidas Speed Factory in Ansbach.
The exhibition showcases the process of the project and the 30 footwear prototypes, breaking down the complexity of innovative technologies.
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Exhibition in collaboration with Stephen Russell

Facilitation of lecture series and workshops to foster creativity in the adidas community.
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Guests:
Sissel Tolaas x adidas Football - Scent and the gym of the senses
Thomas Lommee - Openstructures x adidas Retail - Modular systems
Eugenia Morpurgo and Sophia Guggenberger - AnotherShoe x adidas Originals - Modular Footwear design
Massimo Banzi - Arduino x adidas IT Innovations - Electronics and Maker culture
Daniera ter Haar & Christoph Brach - Raw Color x adidas Creative Direction Color and Materials - Colour Research
Cris Wiegandt & Lacy Barry - Crizilla x adidas Brand Design Identity and Packaging - Paper-craft and Stop-motion animation

Podcasting is happening
Mints is a podcast mini-series about the adidas Clark Kents and the Peter Parkers who devote their evenings, weekends and holidays to chasing dreams which complement their professional lives. Stories about makers and doers that aim at inspiring my colleagues to chase their after-work dreams and missions.

Active between 2016 and 2019, Marea was a design consultancy that developed Made in Italy manufacturing solutions.
I co-founded Marea with the intent of exploring the Italian manufacturing districts to create connections with design companies abroad while promoting the Italian "saper fare" (know-how) and cultural heritage.
In the images above a selection of our projects that we developed for differet clients.

Clients:
- Vincent Sheppard
- Muun
- Niclas Jorgensen
- MyKilos
- Coordination Berlin‍

Wonder Lamp is a light study that revolves around a dichroic filter, a diffuser and a gesture.
The lamp can be switched on simply by pulling a small cord. The lamp shades,

Future-proof scenarios and product development
Domestick Landscapes is a system of magnetic textile modules that can be combined in order to accommodate different functions depending on the user needs. The system is thought to be used as a temporary and evolving space separation layer in the current and future home, smaller and more open than ever. The project is the first consolidation of my interests in living trends and in anticipating human needs with a new system of products. The project required close collaboration with an Italian embroidery workshop in order to develop a manufacturing method to trap magnets into textile layers using many embroidery heads simultaneously.

Arm-knitted and hand-crocheted furnishings
Knitted army is a collection of furnishings made by arm-knitting or hand-knotting textile offcuts from textile factories.
The strong craft element of the project links the maker to her/his product making every product unique.
The performative aspect of the process made this project viral enough to start a movement of DIYers across the world. As the Wall Street Journal reports Knitted Army can be recognised as the first spark of the Arm Knitting movement.
Knitted Army has been shown in galleries and museums such as Bensimon Paris and Bauhaus Archive Berlin and in many other design events across Europe between 2012-13.

A teatrical setting for a nomadic exhibition in Milan
‍When I stepped into Fabien Dumas office for my internship interview, I thought I was going to design lamps for the upcoming 6 months. It turned out that instead, I worked on a big group exhibition for Ventura Lambrate in collaboration with Werner Aisslinger Studio and the event agency DMY. The concept of the exhibition was to stage the products in theatrical settings. While helping Fabien on the fabrication of his own theatrical settings, what I mostly enjoyed was to contribute to the making of the exhibition. My ideas were taken into account, such as the idea of hosting every setting in a shipping crate lifted on two trestles. The format of the crate was back then thought to be like a picture format 4:3.
In this way by taking a picture of each designer's work, the work would have been more sharable on social media like facebook.
Few years later Flip Sellin, founder of Coordination Berlin, asked me if I was to design the exhibition again what I would do differently. My answer was that I would make square shaped crates.