Cleer Arena: compostable mycelium packaging with Braille — Red Dot Best of the Best 2026

Cleer's Arena is a heavy, mobile party speaker. Its packaging had to protect the product, be easy to handle, and communicate the brand's values — and the team wanted inclusivity and sustainability to be core, not add-ons.

Design packaging as first brand contact: Braille, front-opening access, compostable mycelium inlay and a QR guide engineered into one scalable box.

The outer box is recycled cardboard; the inlay is fully compostable mushroom pulp. A front panel opens outward so the 12 kg speaker is never lifted vertically, Braille markings guide visually impaired users, and a QR code replaces the printed manual. Design was iterated with user testing by visually impaired users and reworked for cost, manufacturability and supply-chain reliability.

Won Red Dot Best of the Best 2026 with a jury verdict of 'packaging with soul', and became Cleer's packaging framework for future products — establishing a new in-house approach to materials, sourcing and tool development.

Cleer's Arena is a 12 kg mobile party speaker, and its packaging had to solve a problem most boxes ignore: how a heavy product gets carried out of a store, opened, and unboxed without strain or frustration. The design team started from the user's body, not the product's specs. The box opens from the front so the speaker never has to be lifted vertically, and the structure was built around easy carrying.

The team also refused to treat accessibility as an add-on. Braille markings were integrated into the graphics from the start and validated in user testing with visually impaired people; the guidance for opening the box is designed to be intuitive for everyone. A QR code links to a quick-start guide, eliminating the printed manual, while the inlay is made of fully compostable mushroom pulp and the outer box of recycled cardboard.

The result won Red Dot's Best of the Best in Product Design 2026, with the jury calling it 'a visionary, inclusive and sustainable solution' — 'packaging with soul'. It was also designed as a scalable framework: Cleer built new manufacturing tools and sourcing relationships around it, and the project became the packaging model for future Cleer products.

The design started from the physical experience of carrying a 12 kg product instead of from graphics or branding.

Braille and accessibility were engineered in from the beginning and tested with visually impaired users, not bolted on at the end.

Compostable mycelium inlay and recycled cardboard replaced foam and plastic without compromising protection.

The box was built as a reusable framework — one packaging system, tools and supply chain — for the whole product line.

Accessibility and sustainability fail as afterthoughts; when they are designed in from the first sketch — and validated with the people they serve — they improve the experience for every user.

After the Red Dot Best of the Best 2026 win, Cleer described the Arena packaging as the foundation for future generations of products, with new manufacturing processes and tooling developed for it. The designer noted that the project changed Cleer's whole packaging approach — user experience, materials, sourcing and production — rather than just improving a single box.