Author: Delphine Hirasuna

Advertising

The Google+ Urban Maze Game

By Delphine Hirasuna |

To introduce its new Maps game, Google+ built a real-life version of Google Maps in the shape of a gigantic yellow cube, and had two players navigate the urban maze by rolling and tilting a little blue ball across the thoroughfares to reach its destination. Created by San Francisco-based Venable Bell & Partners with New York-based 1st Ave Machine, the “Explore Your World” video promotes the online version of this game by demonstrating how it works if it were life-size.

Packaging

A Nutty Approach to Brand Design

By Delphine Hirasuna |

The product used to be called NutsOnline and its packaging identity was totally generic and forgettable. So, when the New Jersey-based online retailer secured the domain name “Nuts.com,” it set out to change its image by hiring a powerhouse team to design a new logo and packaging. The result is an identity that looks like it was created by precocious third-graders – but in a good way. The letters were hand-drawn by Pentagram partner Michael Bierut and digitized by type designer Jeremy Mickel. Illustrator Christoph Niemann made line-drawings of the gang of playful nuts. The effect is fresh and charming, and unconventionally nutty. As breezily executed as this design looks, it takes skill to make it appear spontaneous and carefree and not amateurish and crudely done. A closer looks shows there is a hierarchy to the information on the box and an organization to the design. Even the see-through nut personalities give consumers a glimpse of the product inside. This is sophisticated design made to look naïve.

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Packaging

Alternative Organic Packaging

By Delphine Hirasuna |

Sydney-based design agency, The Creative Method, says “give us a great story and we’ll give you a great brand.” So when Alternative Organic Wine asked them to design the packaging for a premium limited edition of its organic Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc, they focused on the product’s naturalness and not on the traditional way that luxury wines are presented. Creative Method explains that the “concept shows a vine, from the leaves to the bark to the wine.” Every aspect of the packaging was natural, from the outer wrapping paper with the grape leaf pattern printed using organic inks, to the laser-cut balsa wood label, to the string and the wax seal used to affix the label. Just by looking at the packaging, it communicates unique and organic.