The Story
The birth of Adidas’ workplace-of-the-future concept “MyArena” at the Adidas Group HQ campus in Herzogenaurach, Germany, also brought to fruition an environment where creativity is king with Adidas naming it the “MakerLab”. Aimed at championing creativity, the first MakerLab launched at the Adidas headquarters in Germany in 2016, allows designers to dream up new sneakers with experimental forms and fabrics.
Oxford Languages defines Creativity as “the use of imagination or original ideas to create something; inventiveness”.
Forming the backbone of the MakerLab network are three spaces – Herzogenaurach, Germany, Portland, Oregon and Brooklyn, New York – that offer everything needed to play and experiment towards new horizons. The MakerLab network isn’t about creating stuff that end up onto the next season’s catwalk. It is essentially a hub for all of the brand’s ideation.
A studio that was previously accessible only to Adidas’ employees and invited designers have now been extended to involve Adidas’ customers. In the same spirit of collaborative creativity, and exclusive to Singapore, the MakerLab will serve all customisation needs of Adidas’ fans, whether one is looking at primping out his/her Adidas clothes, shoes or sporting gear. The customisation options are inspired by Singapore and its sporting scene reimagined; created in collaboration with leading creatives such as Aeropalmics, Marina A., Reza Hasni and Yana and Jun.
KIN had the privilege of working very closely with the Adidas Singapore team; by becoming an extension of their team to actualise the Adidas MakerLab at the newly opened 963 square metres Adidas “Home of Sport” Flagship store in VivoCity, Singapore.
Over a period of more than three months; from planning to execution, we were involved in the brainstorming of ideas on the different kinds of garment and accessory customisations as well as the most appropriate equipment to support the creations. We had to research, source and procure different printers and heat-transfer machines. An e-Lookbook was designed and developed for the customisation of garments and integrating it to the printing and heat-transfer machines. Our work also included training the Adidas team on how the machines work.
We will continue to provide Adidas with on-going service and project management for the re-stocking of consumable items as well as updating the e-Lookbook whenever there are new seasonal customisation designs.
We were beyond being just vendors to Adidas. We aim to achieve a win-win together with the Adidas team. We are not merely order-takers but strive to find out and deliver what the client doesn’t know or want but desire.
