Louise Marsland (@Louise_Marsland)’s weekly pick of recent product, packaging, design and food launches:
- Joe Public Amsterdam ‘owns’ Valentine’s Day
- Hennessy’s design collaboration
- Kauai launches in Mauritius, and
- the Rado Star design prize is awarded
Sealed with a kiss
Joe Public Amsterdam pulled off a loving gesture in the Netherlands on Valentine’s Day 2015 by enabling everyone who wanted to post a Valentine’s card or postcard to a loved one to do so stamp-free— using a kiss instead — and create this loving feeling for client, PostNL.
PostNL undertook to deliver all cards for Valentine’s Day on 14 February, provided that senders kissed the corner of their envelopes or postcards and posted their love letters before 5pm on 13 February.
To make this happen, PostNL adapted its stamp-scanning machinery to recognise lipstick kisses and ‘test-kissed’ about 500 postcards to make sure the campaign stunt would work.
“At Joe Public, we believe that great creative ideas can help grow our clients business. This creative idea was aimed at being both relevant and personal for the occasion; this was the perfect way to do it,” says Antoine Houtsma, creative director, Joe Public Amsterdam.
And, no, I’m not even going to mention our Post Office — this is a post about love.
Message in a bottle
A collaboration between Hennessy and designer Peter Saville has birthed the creation of a limited-edition bottle, Hennessy V.S.O.P by Peter Saville, in part celebration of the cognac’s 250th year, which includes a ‘world tour’ by the brand.
Saville was art director and co-founder of Factory Records, and has done work for Joy Division, New Order, Selfridges, Pringle, Christian Dior, Stella McCartney and more brands.
Saville immersed himself in the whole production cycle of cognac, its origins and the process of cognac making. He was intrigued by the notion of contrast, the brand reports. “It seemed to me as though the distillation process did not end with the grape itself; cognac continues to be rarefied by its context,” Saville said.
Saville focused his research on the distillation process and the vine itself. Browsing through a data bank produced a scientific rendering of one of the vine protein’s genomes, a notion that intrigued the artist both aesthetically and philosophically, stated Hennessy. By reinterpreting the genome sequence in his signature style as a colour-coded representation of the grape, Saville quickly broke out of the mathematical context to arrive at a freeform artistic approach.
The Hennessy V.S.O.P by Peter Saville limited-edition bottle offers up a “pattern of life”: a sequence of natural and synthetic colours that is intended to convey eternal themes through an entirely contemporary work of art. Cast against an elegant, matte-gold ground, the colour scheme — a grid-like, seemingly random yet perfectly ordered composition of rich, muted earth tones and “chemical” brights such as neon pink, electric blue and orange — is meant to immediately convey a buoyant, celebratory feeling.
A variation of the same ‘DNA’ motif recurs in gold on a vibrant, specially designed gift box embossed with holographic lettering. Definitely a keepsake!
Paradise found
Kauai, the healthy fast-food chain and Prof Tim Noakes’ banting buddy, has expanded to Mauritius, opening at the Le Caudan waterfront in the capital city, Port Louis, in the new food court.
With a sea-view setting, this Mauritius franchise store will seat 120 customers who will be able to enjoy an alfresco eating experience on the balcony.
“The general global trend is towards consumers becoming more discerning in terms of what they decide to consume for their health. This trend is growing massively in Europe and the USA, and is now coming to our shores. It’s important that we get in and entrench ourselves as the health food brand of choice around the world,” says Kauai co-founder and chief innovations officer, John Berry.
Doll-maker wins Rado Star design prize
Love all the ‘local makes good’ design stories we’ve been getting lately… dare I hope we are moving towards a more design-centric culture in SA, where design-led solutions are gaining more attention?
The Mbari Dolls project of University of Johannesburg FADA (Faculty of Art, Design, Architecture) student, Monica Monsanto, has scooped the Rado Star Prize South Africa, offered by the Swiss watch brand. Her project, completed during her fourth year at UJ, is designed for children from low-income households to enable them to make their own toys using a two-part mould distributed in mielie-meal bags and constructed from paper maché.
The Rado Star South Africa competition gives young designers the opportunity to gain exposure and compete with other local designers. Rado CEO and member of the Rado Star Prize South Africa 2014 jury, Matthias Breschen, says that Monsanto’s design inspired them because of its innovation and ability to benefit the lives of others.
Going forward, Monsanto is looking at developing the project for market. Part of the prize consists of R100 000 prize money to assist her in developing her design further. Watch this ‘making of’ video:
Shelf Life is a weekly column by Louise Marsland. Tweet new product, packaging and design launches to @louise_marsland 
or email her at louise.marsland at gmail.com. Want to sponsor Shelf Life? Contact us here.
Louise has written about the FMCG, media, marketing and advertising industry for over 20 years as a former editor of magazines AdVantage, Marketing Mix and Progressive Retailing, as well as websites Bizcommunity.com and FMCGFiles. She also edited the weekly Wednesday Media & Marketing Page for The New Age newspaper. She is currently the publishing editor of industry trendwatching portal, TRENDAFRiCA, for consumer insight, research and trends in Africa; a regular industry columnist and speaker; a consultant on content strategy; and contributing editor to Fast Company South Africa magazine, which has just launched in South Africa.
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