box vox

Yoav Kotik's Precious Metal

More jewelry of the handcrafted-from-actual-packaging type: Yoav Kotik’s rings, bracelets, necklaces and pendents made from metal bottle caps.

I’m interested in how he manages “raise the bar” on the perceived quality of this jewelry—(made from recycled bottle caps, after all).

On the one hand, his “Precious Metal” collection exploits the pop branding of the source product—(and gains some of the commercial appeal, inherent in the colors and logos of beverage packaging)—on the other hand, his jewelry seems somehow classier and more tasteful. This may be partly due to the photography and the use of precious metal settings, but there’s also evidence here of an artistic sensibility above and beyond the idea of consumers electing to wear brand-name badges (ironic or otherwise).

Some of the logos are cropped and truncated, making them almost abstract. The red ring, above (top, center) has no logo at all—just “100% Pure” and some incomplete “product use” instructions. While this still conflates our sense of ourselves with the products we use—(what does it mean for the wearer to be “100% Pure”?)—it’s not so brand-specific in this case. Not like saying: “I’m a Diet Coke girl,” which is, in effect, the message of a lot of the other pieces.

(Earrings and necklaces, after the fold...)

Buckfast Blowback

Photo by Kieran Dodds via: The New York Times

Some packaging-related content in an article in today’s New York Times...

Paralleling Russia’s battles with alcoholism—(see: Soviet Anti-Alcohol Campaign)—Scotland’s drinking problems are prompting legislation to try and curb alcohol consumption and its attendant bad behavior.

Unfortunately for Buckfast, the popularity of its caffeine-fortified “tonic wine” (with consumers in this market) also makes it a prominent symbol of a social problem.

...the police in the depressed industrial district of Strathclyde recently told a BBC program that the drink had been mentioned in 5,638 crime reports between 2006 and 2009 (the bottle was used as a weapon in 114 of them)...

Legislation to curb drinking is of particular interest here in Scotland’s old industrial heartland, or the “Buckfast Belt,” where Buckfast is considered a regional favorite. The drink is so ubiquitous in this working-class town, not far from Glasgow, that some people call it Coatbridge Table Wine (others call it “loopy juice,” or, adding their own twist as they channel Travis Bickle, “Who’re you lookin’ at?” wine.) Buckfast is no newcomer to the market, having become popular in the first half of the 20th century, when it was prescribed by doctors for down-in-the-dumps miners and sold in drugstores.

One person’s helpful mood improver, though, is another’s worryingly effective stimulant. The drink is 15 percent alcohol by volume, a bit stronger than most wines. Also, each 750 milliliter bottle contains as much caffeine as eight cans of Coke.

For Scots, a Scourge Unleashed by a Bottle
By Sarah Lyall, NY Times, February 3, 2010

Interesting that—(like Vimto)—Buckfast began life as a health tonic. Sometime (when there’s time) boxvox must do a round-up of other contemporary products that began as Victorian patent medicines. (Like Coke, for instance.)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Gold Bar Packaging

Paca Rabanne’s “1 Million” men’s fragrance (top row via PopSop); second row, left: Donna Karan’s “Gold” (by Laird+Partners); on right: James Martin’s “Limited Gold Edition” gift box containing 2 wine bottles (via PopSop); third row: Au Olive Oil can (via" the Dieline); on right: Rocawear 9IX “Gold Limited Edition” men’s fragrance; bottom: “chocolate amenities” packaging for Mariott Hotels & Resorts by Miller Creative

Following up on the gold thing from our previous post: gold bars.

A lot of luxury packaging employs metallic inks and gold foils to get across the idea that the product contained is a valuable commodity. While stores are not meant to be like Fort Knox, sometimes packages are designed to resemble gold bars. And just as the world’s supply of minable gold is limited, so too, many of these products are only made available on a “limited edition” basis.

(A possible pitfall to this approach, after the fold...)

Two Golden Packages

Two golden packages: Helena Rubinstein “Gold Future” eye reviver cream jar (top) and Hennessy’s “Paradis Horus” Cognac bottle (below).

Freedom of Creations’ design for the “Gold Future” eye jar includes a flexible nylon helix that encases a smaller gold jar with a cap.

Ferruccio Laviani’s design for the “Paradis Horus” Cognac bottle includes an over-sized stopper that frames the bottle in a stylized overflow of golden liquid. (More images at Design Boom.)

Although gold packaging is pretty typical for luxury goods like cosmetics and liquor, the timing of these two recent packages may seem counterintuitive, considering the current economic climate. Why flaunt the golden excess of luxury packaging at a time when Wall Street is getting so much criticism over excessive bonus pay?

It may be, however, that this is the perfect time for golden packaging. The name “Gold Future,” while sounding luxuriously optimistic, is also a pretty unambiguous reference to the “safe haven” investment strategy of buying gold during times of economic instability.

Running against the trend to lighten packaging—(and its carbon footprint)—both of these designs use extra materials to create an illusion of solid gold plasticity. For the eye cream: a flexible golden skin that can be peeled off in a coil. For the cognac: a simulated geyser of golden liquid that can be popped off like a cork.

(via Lovely Package and PopSop)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Packaging Jewelry

Pepsi can earrings from 824 Nothing More

Following the functional traditions of jewelry-as-container—(reliquary lockets of hair, perfume ampoule necklaces and the like)—it should come as no surprise, perhaps, that many consumers are continuing to adorn themselves with packaging jewelry. This includes both miniature CPG jewelry and jewelry crafted from fetish packaging parts (like soda can pull tabs).

Top row: some soda can charms and a “crushed” silver Budweiser beer can pendant; 2nd row, left: Maison Martin Margiela’s can tab ring (via: Hybrid Nation); on right: Jack Daniel’s bottle cuff-links; 3rd row, left: Alex and Chloe’s Can Tab pendent in 14K Gold; on right Colgate toothpaste tube earrings; 4th row: Dannie Glam’s “Candy in a Bottle” necklace; 5th row: Sidney Mobell’s 1990 “Diamond and Gold Sardine Can”; Bottom, left: George Estrella’s sterling silver “Sardine Can Pendant”; Bottom, right: Ricky Boscarino’s sterling silver “Sardine Can” with bronze key and copper fish

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Supergraphic Wacky Packs

60s kid-satire, “Wacky Packs” meets early 70s, “supergraphics” via Philadelphia-based LTL Prints’ peel & stick wall graphics.

Last year I was touting my decorating acumen for having framed a Wacky Pack press sheet to decorate our office. But these large-scale Wacky Packs (available in sizes up to 7 feet tall) raise a serious client-relations question. How far do I dare go with the Wacky Packaging decor?

Some of these mock packages actually imply that the products they contain are maybe not so good. Is that the message I really want to send? Certainly not the usual market-speak of a consumer packaged goods design firm. Maybe that’s refreshing.

What do you think? If you were a client, would it alienate you? And which one of the Wacky Packages below, do you think would look good, say, seven feet long over our conference table—I mean, without damaging our credibility with you?

 

(Another room photo, after the fold...)

Dollhouse Packaging

Play Scale Minis: seeing to it that the cupboards and pantries of today’s dollhouses are are fully stocked with miniature consumer packaged goods.

(A different dollhouse miniature company and a different product category, after the fold...)

Cross-Category Packaging (Part 5: Bottles and Jars)

This will probably be the last of the cross-category posts—(unless I discover some huge, unsuspected batch of cross-category toothpaste tubes packaging.)

Meanwhile, here are some cross-categorical bottles & jars. Sometimes glass, sometimes plastic, but all containing solid stuff, rather than anything liquid, as such.

1. Lots of candy is packaged in little plastic bottles and jars. Candy is one of those categories that seems very inclined towards cross-category packaging in general. (See: Soda Candy and Medicine Cabinet Candy) Kids seem to have some innate, cultural fascination with packaging. (See: Wacky Packages) Whether these simulated packages are appealing to kids as toys for “playing house” or as some sort of consumer-in-training, developmental thing, candy makers have apparently noticed that kids go for it. Baby Bottle Pop is the example we’re featuring here today.

2. The “Bottle Rockets Waterproof Nova” vibrator, too, comes packaged in a bottle. (via)

3. For some reason: Cupcake in a Jar. (Although this idea seems kind of counter-intuitive to me.)

4. Two watches: A swatch watch that comes in a bottle, and the Too Late watch (that we also featured: here) comes in a jar. (Photo via NotCot)

5. A treasure map puzzle that comes in a bottle. (See: Packaging Puzzles)

6. Two powdered mixes: a “9 Grain Beer Bread Mix” that comes in a beer bottle, and a pancake mix that comes in a conveniently half-empty plastic jug. (So that you can add the wet ingredients and “shake” it.) via weirdmeat.com

7. Baby gear including a “Six Bunnies” body suit in a pink jar, and baby bibs in baby-food jars—(yet another cross-category pack from FreshWear, a company that seems to be all about the cross-category packaging. See also: Milk Cartons and Egg Cartons.)

8. Spice Salt in a Tabasco bottle

9. Giant Art Jar of craft supplies

10. A survivor kit in a bottle—(not to be confused with the survivor kit in a sardine can!)

11. A firefly-theme T-shirt that come in a jar with holes on the top. (See: Packaging as Imprisonment)

(Another picture, after the fold...)

Crescent Row

Nicely illustrating the package-as-house metaphor—(the package is a little house where the product lives)—is: Benefit Cosmetics’s “Crescent Row” neighborhood of house-shaped boxes, each containing a cocktail-shaker-shaped can of fragrance.

(More, after the fold...)

Packaging Signs

A sardine-can-shaped sign from vw4y’s Flickr Photostream

While looking for cross-categorical, sardine-can-shaped packs, I happened upon this sardine-can sign.

Which reminded me that I had, for some time, been planning to eventually feature a round-up of package shaped signs. (See below) Similar to the architectural “roadside packaging” and the “packaged water towers.”

With these packages, however, there’s no secondary function, aside from just being rather attention-getting signs.

I am sorry to say: I seemed to have lost all record of where I found all these photos. If your photo is here, please let me know and I’ll see to it that you are credited properly. (Or remove it, if you prefer.) 

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Packaging Cameras

Top row, left: Velveeta box camera from Allee Willis’s Blog; on right: Coke Can cameras from eBay;  2nd row, left: film canister camera via I New Idea; 3rd row, right: Fanta can camera from CircusCat’s photostream; center: King’s Cigarette box camera from Rick Soloway’s photostream; on right: instant coffee jar camera from eBay; 4th row left: chocolate milk box camera from Four Corners Dark; center: juice box camera from Zebriana’s photostream; on right: Budweiser Beer can camera (from eBay, I think); bottom row, left: Smarties camera from RockyCameras.com; on right: “Zeon Tech” Pepsi camera from Arthur Smokes’ photostream

There seems to be no end to the personal accessory categories in which you can find objects designed to resemble consumer packaged goods. We’ve already covered cigarette lighters, telephones and transistor radios. (Not to mention: salt & pepper shakers) Now we’re looking at package-shaped cameras.

Are they merely advertising promotions or are they products in their own right? Are they toys or another example of extreme brand loyalty?

(Another packaging camera—& the box that it came in—after the jump...)

Anthro-Packs on Parade

More to add to our anthropomorphic packaging collection: a 1948 television commercial for Rheingold Beer with bottles and cans as musicians in a marching band. (via: The Prelinger Archive)

(Also featuring a “packaging train” for our vehicular packaging collection.)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

where there’s life...

A few things about this album cover:

1. It’s a “droste effect” package. Pictured within the scene on this album cover—(as with the old Droste brand cocoa box)—is the album cover, itself. (Only one iteration for some reason.)

2. It’s another example of Budweiser’s audiophile marketing. (See: Bud Light Speaker Box.) Having sponsored this 1960 Russ David recording, they featured their beverage packaging (a bottle) on the album cover.

3. Its title track is a jazzy version of their 1950s jingle, “Where There’s Life, There’s Bud.”

(MP3 via: Schadenfreudian Therapy) The other songs on the LP all have the word “life” in their title, (predating a similarly linguistic concept album, “i” by Magnetic Fields, in which every song begins with the letter, i).

(Additional ephemeral evidence, after the fold...)

Electroluminescent Liquor Packaging

Upper left: Ballantine’s new electroluminescent label for blended scotch whisky; on right: TyKu’s sake bottle with LED light source; lower left: J&B’s “Mix Light” bottle.

Ballantine’s new “Listen to Your Beat” campaign includes an electroluminescent label with graphic equalizer display. Designed by London-based “The Core,” this label is more evidence of a trend towards animated, self-illuminating liquor labels. Similar to these battery-powered T-shirts, audio references seem to occur frequently in youth-oriented liquor packaging. (The J&B bottle above is another example.)

Battery powered, self-illuminating containers we’ve seen before—(See: NXT on the dieline and this article on Electroluminescent Technology from Packaging Digest)—but it seems to be gaining a particular foothold in the category of liquor packaging.

(One more photo and several videos of electroluminescent labels in action, after the fold...)

Packaging Disaster(s)

Via The Huffington Post: a spectacular packaging disaster in Moscow, captured on a warehouse security camera. Most of the news coverage is focusing heavily on the irony. (Hapless Russian forklift operator, driving while under the influence of alcohol, destroys over a $100,000 worth of Cognac & Vodka) Some of the coverage also seeks to use the event as a teaching opportunity about Russian alcoholism. (See: NY Times News blog)

But isn’t our interest in this video more prurient than sociological? It may be mean-spirited schadenfreude, but who among us is not fascinated by this kind of disaster porn?

And yet... if you’ve ever glanced warily up at the towering shelves in a warehouse store and wondered if you were truly safe wandering the aisles below, this footage will not reassure you.

(Another video and a faux packaging disaster, after the fold...)

Budweiser Phones

Researching prior art for the earlier post on Bud Light’s audio speaker box, I found there were quite a few Budweiser telephones available for sale on eBay. (Mostly beer can-shaped phones, but a few shaped like bottles, as well.) A similar advertising promotion to package-shaped transistor radios, I suspect that these are just the tip of the iceberg.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Bud Light Speaker Box

Lower photo from DrunkenTailgate.com

Part of Bud Light’s new “Tailgate Approved” campaign: a 24-Bottle Case “Speaker Box” with a built-in, disposable speaker. Not their first excursion into audio gear, but a milestone, perhaps, in “convenient” disposability. And a strange counter-insurgency for Budweiser to be promoting a disposable sound system at a time when DIY recyclers are making home-brewed speakers out of tin cans and the like. (See: Tin Can Amp)

Some have compared the audio quality of the single speaker to that of a novelty greeting card, but maybe it’s a monophonic teaching moment for tailgate party-goers to fully appreciate those vintage, pre-stereo mixes.

(Some earlier Budweiser audio gear, after the fold...)

Nicholas Fevelo's Water Museum

“Staten Island Water Museum” by Nicholas Fevelo: on left samples of water from various bodies of water on Staten Island (including at least one bottle of someone’s used bath water); on right: “found” bottles of urine (Photos by Debby Davis)

Around 1986, at the height of the 1980s real estate boom, my pregnant wife and I joined a group homesteading an abandoned building in the South Bronx. Plumbing was on a DIY basis and, in one of the bedroom closets of our newly assumed home, we found stacks and stacks of Ballantine Ale bottles, each filled with urine.

Nicholas Fevelo’s “Staten Island Water Museum” reminded me of that. Found objects have had a long cultural history in contemporary art—(Duchamp’s “readymade” urinal comes to mind)—but for someones private collection of urine-filled bottles to be found by someone else and then put on public display raises interesting questions. Whose urine is this? Is this the evidence of a homeless, plumbingless life? Or just the foul aftermath of someones illicit drinking party with no convenient bathroom?

Favelo was one of the ten artists participating in the aforementioned “Mapping Staten Island Show” where stacks of shipping pallets served as the gallery walls and pedestals.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Ted McDonah's Recyclures

Fishing lures by Arizona-based metalsmith, Tedd McDonah made from recycled cans. Recylures. I’m no fisherman, but I sure like these as objets d’art. For sale on Etsy. (Rollover photo above to see his stockpile of used metal containers.)

(via Unconsumption)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Bottle Fish, Can Fish

Left: Canada Dry beverage ad (from Mississippi Pack Ratz); right: vintage Chicken of the Sea ad (from I don’t remember where)

The idea of product packages swimming around in the open sea must have seemed like a cute, whimsical notion in the 1950s. Nowadays, with the negative associations of beach pollution and the floating “garbage patch,“ it’s hard to imagine anyone in advertising floating this concept as a way of promoting consumer packaged goods.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design