Monday, April 18, 2011

Lovely Package! (AKA I have no witty subtitle because the title itself is awesome.)



We're all nuts for good design.


Lovely Package (and its recently opened sister site, Lovely Stationery) is a site collecting examples of excellent (and excellently quirky) package design from all over the world, and includes both professional work and student work. The idea of doing three-dimensional design tends to scare the everloving snapdragons out of me, but seeing the work featured on here is very inspiring and gives me ideas to file away for potential use later (in either my standard illustrative 2D designs or for an actual 3D product design later).

As someone mentioned in a blog post (or a blog comment?) earlier, playful design like this can really connect with people because of its playfulness. In this case, it's not really about the product itself; it's about using design to sell an experience that features a product. I was reading a marketing book recently that cited a case study in which they tested the claims of a company that said that the specific designs of their wine glasses supposedly enhanced the taste of any wine. The people who ran the case study eventually found that while wine drinkers (I think it might've been both experts and casual drinkers) reported better taste when they were aware of the wine glass design and what it was supposed to do, when wine glass design was screened out, almost no one could tell the difference between wine from a regular glass and wine from the "special" glass. It was the drinkers' experience/expectation of what the wine glass would do for them that enhanced their experience of the wine. I think this indicates that design is heavily psychological beyond a simple "yellow is a happy color!" sort of paradigm, and I wonder if there should be (or is already) a required class called "The Psychology of Design" or something that would teach budding designers how to brainwash the masses -- I MEAN teach designers how to effectively utilize psychological principles in creating their designs in order to better connect to their audience.

14 comments:

  1. I have noticed that there are more and more package designs that are hand drawn and seems to be a trend that is growing. The Psychology of Design would be a great class.

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  2. We are so often taught about what is right, what sells, and all that. I think people appreciate a little relaxed and friendly design, something out of the ordinary!

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  3. I completely agree that design is an experience. Color and form really give you an emotional, or psychological effect, that people are not aware of when they look at things. This is basically what I want to surround my final piece. If there was a class on the psychology of design, I would definitely sign up.

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  4. Thanks for the links--those are great sites. And I think you're right...a design sets the mood for a product, event, idea, which definitely contributes to the experience of a consumer.

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  5. This is great. Packaging design is incredibly important. I really hope that more people begin to make minimal packaging though. I really hate buying something and then having a ridiculous amount of trash to throw out because of the 7 layers of non-recyclable plastic that they encase it in.

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  6. Labels can be such a great source of inspiration in design. I love looking at wine labels, which range from elegant to cartoony. I still find I prefer the older simpler labels done in the 60s, for instance I like the labels from Pepsi more then than now. I will often find old products at estate sales (non-perishable types) and buy them just for the packaging. I bought a box of Atlas washers a couple months back just because the packaging is too cool. But, again, wine labels I could stare at for hours just sifting through all the different one they have. Not only do they have great illustrations and graphics on wine labels but the typography is fantastic to look at. Ironically, I only look (not much for the taste of wine). Nutella echoes that simplicity of the sixties very nicely and the illustration is simple and pleasant to look at as well. Thanks for links. I look forward to investing many hours looking through the designs, especially on the stationary site.

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  7. To echo what TOny said and expand, I think most alcohol advertisements are very interesting in general. I am a big fan of beer (especially craft beer) labels, as many of you who have been in my classes might understand from projects I've done. I think a great thing about package design is that it's just like book design in that people will buy something just because it looks cool - knowing nothing what it's really about.

    One particularly interesting series of labels are the Flying Dog labels that rely heavily on illustration and are actually really weird (and have nothing to do with beer!)

    http://www.flyingdogales.com/Beer-Pack.aspx

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  8. I would, for the record, LOVE a psychology of design class.

    Thanks for the resource - I'm delving into packaging design for my capstone and the inspiration is much appreciated!

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  9. I agree with Lauren, that would be really interesting to have a psychology of design class. Your links are great, I think packaging design is something that is important because it can attach a person to the product especially if they remember a brand and its design.

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  10. The phrase "don't judge a book by its cover" seems to be a phrase that all designers want to make sure everyone ignores, and the packaging design or cover of a book is very important to attracting potential audience/buyers. I would love to take Psychology of Design!

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  11. I like how you describe the playfulness of the design to help sell the experience of the product rather than the idea of the product. More proof that 3-d elements in design help to make that design more personable to the viewer!

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  12. Actually, in Mexico one of my cousin's cousin took psychology of colors along with his business/marketing degree. I was really miffed at the fact that we don't have something like this. And on a side note I love Nutella.

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  13. I agree with your statement that "it's about using design to sell an experience". If you can be successful in your design, the product should be able to sell itself.

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  14. I completely agree with the idea that "design is heavily psychological"- which reminds me of the retail industry, which completely manipulates this notion.

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