Alphabet Matchbox Tea was a result of one of our experiments for creating innovative packaging with respect to an FMCG product under Bizongo Design Lab. We started by picking tea as the primary product and built our idea of adding layers in implications to how it was packaged, one step at a time.
We began with the concept of merging alphabets with tea, so that your tea can be customised according to each letter from A-Z (we took the creative liberty of inventing fictitious flavours of tea to make that happen) It was later that we thought of combining this with matchboxes and phillumeny because why not! The thought of having a collection of 26 exotic teas in matchboxes in an exclusive and elaborate fashion as a gift to any tea connoisseur excited us. We relished creating the list and discovering the dimensions of our everyday drink - from bizarre ones like X tea (always surprises you with the flavour it holds. Every pack has a new one!) and usual suspects like ‘C for Chamomile Tea’ to interesting ones like W for White Monkey tea (named so because the tea leaves resemble the white paw of the monkey). To see the development of the concept of this collector's edition, we went ahead and created paper prototypes surrounding 4 letters and suggested how the entire set would work through a line diagram.
Since all of us have seen quaint Indian matchboxes and how they visually look, the aim here was to try and steer away from our idea of those and build a visual language that allows us to experiment with typography and geometry with respect to each tea flavour.
In India, sweets are a big deal during festivals and as we grew up, we may not have understood why we celebrated a particular festival, but we surely recalled every one of them with the sweet or savoury associated with it. Hence when it came to designing packaging based around sweets in Bizongo Design Lab, we picked Kaju Katli, our all time favourite.
In this project, we tried to challenge the stereotypical idea of a diamond shaped/ square Kaju Katli, and decided to have it cut according to what the concept demanded. Another thought that was in our minds was about how all the sweet boxes were discarded once people consumed the sweets. And considering the amount of sweets we consume as a nation, that’s a lot of boxes we are talking about! So we began thinking in a direction that attracted interactiveness in packaging so that people see value in retaining it. We wanted something unique and with an element of fun that usually went hand-in-hand with festivity, and that is when we hit upon the idea of tangrams. A Tangram is a Chinese geometrical puzzle consisting of a square cut into seven pieces which can be arranged to make various other shapes.
What could these Chinese puzzles have anything to do with Kaju Katlis? Nothing until now, but there are many advantages this presents. Firstly, it is great that once the sweet is consumed, the packaging becomes an interactive plaything. Tangrams are for all ages and hence transcend to becoming a family game. Received too many Kaju Katli boxes? No problem! The game gets bigger and better. Add the tans and make more interesting shapes out of your imagination.
Another advantage is that these seven tans would divide the bigger box into seven smaller boxes, making it easier to share or allot sweets to a large family or the diet conscious. So we went ahead and prototyped one such box. Challenging convention again, we decided to have a big black box of these tangram sized boxes with a silver ribbon that resonated with the shimmery silver that we usually find on Kaju Katlis. Along with that, a small square insert detailing the game and giving a few interesting shapes that one could try was placed within the box.
Bournville is the known to be the most popular brand of dark chocolate within the Indian market.
The challenge was to create a premium pack of four Bournville chocolates that could be customized for gifting on various occasions. The design of the pack had to be simple, sophisticated and sleek that resonated with the primary packaging design and brand values of the Bournville chocolate. The outer box of the library had a groove placed to make it ergonomic and convenient to slide out the packs of Bournville. The simplistic border around each inner boxes of the pack denoted the flavors while maintaining a visual harmony
Líso Chocolatier was established in the small town of Kolenchery in Kerala and was nurtured out of a deep-rooted passion for chocolate. The company manufactures chocolates and spreads rich in cocoa and other exotic ingredients. Currently, the company has presence in over 200 stores (general and modern trade across Kerala).
With the packaging design, the goal was to bring the artisan character of the spreads on to the label, so the packaging could convey the vision of the founders. The illustration style chosen for the final designs portrayed the ingredients of each flavour of the spread in their best light.
Cadbury had to foray into the e-commerce gifting segment under the umbrella of "Joy Deliveries" for the festival of Rakhi, for which they partnered with Bizongo for a complete packaging solution involving Design, Development, and Procurement.
We designed a limited edition, Rakshabandhan festival pack pertaining to an assortment of Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolates, along with accessories like Rakhi and Roli chawal. The gift packs were designed with a celebratory theme that would capture the special bond between a brother and a sister and I had the opportunity to illustrate them for this project.
