Minute Box uses the seven contrasts of design — size, weight, form, structure, texture, colour, and direction — to playfully and effectively package alarm clocks designed for young clock enthusiasts. This creative alarm clock set encompasses a retro twinbell alarm clock, nine calendar cards, and unique packaging design that does not require glue and can be repurposed to have multiple second lives.
Design Inspiration
Inspired by the works of Paul Rand and Shiegeo Fukuda, Minute Box uses the seven contrasts of design — size, weight, form, structure, texture, colour, and direction — to playfully and effectively package retro-style alarm clocks for young clock enthusiasts. Patterned with a playful arrangement of type and imagery, Minute Box provides interesting information about clocks and the history of time keeping. Calendar cards designed with the same colour scheme and aesthetic allow a coherent design as the packaging can be transformed into a calendar/stationary box.
With simple incisions and folds, Minute Box has a total of three possible lives; an initial life as a container that packages alarm clocks, and an two after-lives as either a calendar box or a stationary container. The unique locking tabs hold the package together without the need of glue. Bubble warp and styrofoam padding that normally would be used to safe-keep the clock within the package is replaced with folded cardboard that later can be used as the section dividers for the box.
The purpose of package design is to design packaging that will safely and efficiently deliver product. Minute Box achieves this but also achieves sustainable initiative by using critical design thinking to find alternative solutions that deviate away from the one-time-use consumer mindset.
Sustainable Package Design
Sustainability is a shared responsibility between government, industry, and citizen. Whether you are a designer, manufacturer, business owner, student... the responsibility of sustainable initiative is one that everyone equally shares. Modern society currently lives in a "throw-away" culture where things, people, and even places are thrown away on a daily basis without any speculation of its environmental impact. Post-consumer waste — many of which are toxic, non-biodegradable, or environmentally destructive — is a major contributor to global climate change. With the increasing resource scarcity, it is more urgent than ever that solutions to post-consumer waste be found and sustainable initiative be encouraged.
Minute Box is a student design project that explores sustainable packaging by demonstrating that one does not need to depend on the use of glue, styrofoam, and plastic wrap to efficiently package products. Instead, critical design thinking can be used to find alternative solutions that deviate away from the one-time-use consumer mindset.
Awards
2016 Adobe Design Achievement Awards Semi-Finalist
