IKEA RENTAL SCHEME

Fancy renting your furniture from now on? Well that is what IKEA are predicting will be their business model of the future. According to their CEO Torbjorn Loof, the company is moving towards a more sustainable model after mass producing essentially disposable furniture for the past 75 years.

The pilot scheme is looking to prolong the life of the products by moving to a 'circular model' rather than encouraging throwaway purchases. This means leased products will be refurbished and sold again once they're returned to a store to encourage customers to 'care for' their products.

It will be interesting to see if the pilot scheme is a success. Co-ownership , co-housing and leasing as opposed to outright ownership is a growing trend and one which brands need to monitor.

KIT KAT SAKE

Nestle has been busy lately. The company recently opened a pop-up bar in Tokyo to mark the release of its new sake-flavoured Kit Kat bar.

“Craft Sake Week @Kit Kat Bar” has been offering visitors a preview of the new Umeshu Plum Sake-flavoured chocolate bar paired with cocktails. The space is overseen by former soccer star Hidetoshi Nakata, now known for his work with more than 350 local sake breweries designing products to promote their rice wines both nationally and globally.

Two Ume Sake Kit Kat and cocktail pairings served in Milano glasses are the highlight of the pop-up. The cocktails, created by noted craft cocktail designers to complement the flavours of the new Kit Kat, are exclusive to the bar.

This is Grown

Jen Keane is a future focussed designer based in London looking at alternative, future manufacturing.

“Taking an organism-driven approach to material design, I manipulated the growing process of k.rhaeticus bacteria, to employ it in a new form of ‘microbial weaving’. The process optimizes the natural properties of bacterial cellulose to weave a new category of hybrid materials that are strong and lightweight, and allows the potential for entire patterns and products to be designed and grown to shape with little or no wastage. 

I grew the upper of a shoe to show how this could affect the way we make products in the future.  The upper is grown in a single piece with no sewing and one continuous yarn held into place by the cellulose produced by the bacteria. “

H.Theoria

We really love this beautiful and innovative new spirit by H.Theoria who have created 3 exciting new liqueurs using perfumery techniques. The distilled ingredients are blended to convey an emotive memory or feeling; for example, Procrastination includes a blend of tea, leather and herbal notes intended to evoke the feeling of sitting at home in a comfy chair.

The product is innovative and beautiful with the bespoke bottle and branding winning gold in this years Pentawards. Congratulations! 

Crayola Beauty

Crayola and Asos have joined forces to collaborate on an inspiring beauty collaboration.

Crayola Beauty has teamed up with Asos to create is a new vegan, a cruelty-free make up line aimed at 20-somethings.

The collection uses Crayolas playful heritage. The majority of the products come in a stick formula similar to brands like Nudestix, Milk Makeup, and Nars, who all stock easy-to-use chubby pencil-inspired cosmetics.

Among the products are:

95 total shades.
24 shades of stick foundation.
five palettes (three eye, one face, and one color changing lipstick).
cheek crayons.
mascaras.
makeup brushes.

Femme Sex

Ask Maude has offered a female persective on sex products. The company produces products such as condoms, lubes and wipes. The design is based on sexual health and wellbeing. The design aesthetic is refreshingly simple and stylish. The brand has opted for a minimalist colour palette and witty typographic approach. 

"By changing the conversation around sex, we are encouraging people to be more open about what they want [from] their partners and [for] themselves. Maude makes beautiful, easy-to-use items that give people the chance to stop compartmentalizing their sex lives—both in their heads and in their medicine cabinets."

Biodegradable Solutions

As product designers we need to re-think material choices and push clients to opt for alternatives to oil-based and unsustainable material solutions. Brands which design for compostability, recycling, and use innovative materials will be sought out by tomorrows discerning consumers.

Bogo Brush is taking an innovative approach to the everyday toothbrush by making the handle from bamboo, a woody plant which is easily and rapidly grown. The bristles are made from Polyamide 4, which has been shown to naturally degrade within a few months of proper composting.

Ground by Mobile Island

Love this wireless charging unit by Mobile Island. The modular unit can be re-configured to charge multiple products at once. We love the discreet aesthetic of wood, dusty pink and copper.

Think Drink

AREPA

I thought this new drink to aid concentration is interesting. The key ingredients are pine-bark extract Enzogenol, a health ingredient produced by Enzo Nutraceuticals and said to support healthy brain activity and reduce stress, and New Zealand blackcurrants, the anthocynanins from which are said to produce several health benefits, including helping people think sharper under stress. Where do I buy it?

Lidlock paperboard cup

The Lidloc patented design is based upon an extension to a standard cup structure that folds and locks into an integrated lid. This innovative design completely removes the need for a separate plastic lid and will re-invent how paperboard cups are produced, consumed and recycled.

Cyril Drouet, Metsä Board’s Design & Innovation Director has worked closely on this exciting project with his design team and recently presented the Lidloc concept to an invited audience at the Packaging Innovations exhibition. He explains the benefits of this innovative design: “We have designed this to be a one-piece construction that removes the need for a separate plastic lid. It is easy to fold and assemble with a secure lid-locking design. The integrated lid is spill proof and offers extra branding power as it can be printed as one piece with the rest of the cup. The lid also contains an integrated ‘sip’ mechanism for hot beverages as well as being ideal for cold drinks with a straw.”

Lidloc is an example of how Metsä Board is supporting customers to enhance their brands by delivering sustainable and innovative packaging solutions. All Metsä Board’s paperboards are made from a renewable resource – fresh fibres. The fibres are of known origin and they help ensure purity and brightness of appearance.

http://www.metsaboard.com/Media/Product-news/Pages/Lidloc-from-Metsa-Board-breaking-new-ground-in-paperboard-cup-design.aspx

Vanishing plastics

Old toys will self-destruct thanks to vanishing plastic

By Sandrine Ceurstemont

YOUNG, energetic and clean-shaven, Scott Phillips looks the very antithesis of Santa Claus. Just as well: he makes toys disappear.

The Western world’s festive consumer frenzy contributes to a global crisis that has left the planet up to its neck in long-lasting plastic tat, and its oceans, according to a recent estimate, awash with some 250 million tonnes of the stuff. What we wouldn’t give for plastics that could transform into something else, fall apart or even vanish altogether. In his lab at Penn State University, Phillips is on the case. “We make plastic objects disappear all the time,” he says. Perhaps it won’t be too long before the season’s must-have toy comes equipped with a self-destruct button.

But today’s plastics are not just for Christmas. Indeed, their durability and low cost mean that many everyday objects are destined to hang around for decades. We can only guess at how long some plastics survive in landfill, but in many cases it extends beyond the 50 years or so we’ve been producing and discarding them on a grand scale. If we recycle plastic instead, melting it down takes a lot of energy and can release toxic components. And even then, the resulting mix of hard plastics that usually enters a recycling stream creates a polymer soup peppered with various dyes and solvents, so we end up with a hunk of junk plastic fit only for a single, final use, like a park bench.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23231020-800-old-toys-will-selfdestruct-thanks-to-vanishing-plastic/

Feel the pain.

As if reading your bank balance is not painful enough. NDD have created a concept called Scrip: a concept with a provocative idea of using pain to make the user aware of how much they are spending.

"It’s a digitally connected, mechanical brass coin that you load with money like a MetroCard. And as you go about your day, paying for things via wireless NFC connections (like Apple Pay), it offers braille-like tactile feedback so that you recognize how much you’re spending.

"It’s a digital-physical, or a physical-digital object that’s enabling transactions akin to cash," explains NDD founder Gadi Amit. "This project was almost a paradoxical effort to approach interaction design from the perspective of, let’s do something inefficient that people really do have to pay attention to, that’s quite literally trying to stimulate the pain receptors in your body."

Edible Milk packaging

American researchers have developed a material that could save millions and change the face of packaging as we know it. Edible food packaging made of milk protein will offer a more sustainable alternative for the food industry. 

“There is a lot of money to be saved for consumers and the retail business if we can extend the durability of our food products by packaging them in more intelligent ways,” said the environment and food minister, Esben Lunde Larsen.

The casein-based film will replace plastic wraps, reduce non-recyclable/non-biodegradable waste and effectively prevent oxygen from seeping in packaging and spoiling food quickly. 

Citrus Pectin, found in citrus fruits and is claimed to stop prostate cancer and melanoma skin cancer from spreading, is intergraded into the casein to withstand humanity and high temperatures. 

The study’s leader Peggy Tomasula said: "The protein-based films are powerful oxygen blockers that help prevent food spoliage. When used in packaging, they could prevent food waste during distribution along the food chain,"

The casein coating can be sprayed onto food such as cereal flakes or bars, in addition to being used as plastic pouches and wraps.

The study’s co-leader Laetitia Bonnaillie said: "We are currently testing applications such as single-serve, edible food wrappers. For instance, individually wrapped cheese sticks use a large proportion of plastic—we would like to fix that."

http://www.thedieline.com/blog/2016/8/23/edible-milk-packaging

Minimal Branding

The evolution of authenticity, and how stripped back minimal branding came to replace the once prolific heritage trend.

Frog Creates The Most Charming Anti-iPad Game Ever

To ween kids off screens, frogLabs developed a series of wooden toys that are the only way to play the game.

http://www.fastcodesign.com/3059090/frog-creates-the-most-charming-anti-ipad-game-ever

Misoka Toothbrush

This toothbrush may look fairly conventional, but it cleans your teeth without the need for toothpaste, thanks to nanoparticles coating the bristles, which are activated when they’re dipped in water. Developed by Yumeshokunin and designed by TIDS (The Industrial Design Studio), each of the bristles – which at 0.178mm are fine enough to reach into the gaps between the teeth – is coated with microscopic mineral ions. These stay active for around a month, after which it’s time to use a new brush (‘misoka’ means ‘last day of the month’ in Japanese). www.misoka.jp

Adidas Originals

Adidas originals 2016 'Future' campaign by Terence Neale, follows cultural creators through a dystopian array of global future scenarios to a bright future. The reference to cultural trends such as virtual reality, selfies and 'always on’ culture, is a great touch, which the adidas gang walk by.

http://www.highsnobiety.com/2016/01/25/adidas-originals-ss16-future-campaign/

Axe finds the magic.

Axe is reflecting an emerging modern masculinity in the new advert by 72andSunny Amsterdam.

Brand Manager Matthew McCarthy:

"Guys today, particularly young guys, are calling bullshit on those archetypes and saying they won’t be constricted or defined by what it meant to be a guy in past generations," says McCarthy. "What we’ve found is that it’s an incredible time of change for guys, one filled with a lot of opportunities."

A Bro Brand Legacy

McCarthy knows Axe isn't blameless for reinforcing some of these archetypes he mentions, or the stereotypical pressure on guys to "get the girl," but says now the focus is less on defining what a guy's goals should be and instead celebrating whatever his goals are.

"Perhaps in the past, the idea that a guy needs to project a certain outward appearance as being most important, the seismic change lies in the individuality of personal style as key to a guy feeling attractive," says McCarthy. "I think that attractiveness and confidence is still a lot of what this brand is all about, but now what makes this exciting is basically we’re relaunching the brand around this idea of individuality. That’s how we distill the idea and optimism of the brand, the freedom that guys now feel, and want to step into more than ever."

Celebrating Your Thing

At the outset, 72andSunny executive creative director Carlo Cavallone says that discussions focused primarily on the idea of individuality, and the desire to start a new chapter for the brand.

"The most important thing was to get to an idea that reflected the brand best right now today, and something guys could relate to in a very direct way," says Cavallone. "Authenticity was a big thing, as well as inclusivity. It’s a snapshot of all the aspects of masculinity, individuality and attractiveness, and what that means today."

McCarthy says the message behind "Find Your Magic" is about guys finding what makes them unique. "We all have our own thing—a hobby, a style, a physical attribute, or personality trait—whatever helps us express ourselves and makes us unique," says McCarthy. "What we want to do is celebrate that, so the message going forward is about that, championing how they see their masculinity and how they define it. In the past, we’ve used humor, wit, and hyperbole, but going forward you’ll see we'll have a very personalized, optimistic tone."

Social Grooming

Another key aspect of the campaign is that the brand is going well beyond its traditional ads and producing an "Instagroom" video series of grooming tips based on the most frequent questions and searches by guys sourced through Google analytics.

"We looked at analytics, and there’s been a massive increase of guys looking for grooming tips, and there are a lot of this type of content for women, but not for guys," says Cavallone. "The interest is there, so there was an opportunity for us to fill a need. It’s a tool, but it’s also an emotional tool, to convey and inspire confidence in their own individuality. Not long ago, male grooming advice was just 'shave yourself,' but now guys are looking for more."

McCarthy says guys have an interesting relationship with grooming products, in that they want the information, but don’t want to be spoken down to. "Some of the approaches we’ve seen can come across as pedantic and instructional," says McCarthy. "We gleaned a lot of that social search work to see how guys want to be talked to and it needs to be relevant, needs to feel cool, but it also needs to be fast. We’ve produced a whole bunch for the launch, and as the year goes on we’ll be doing more work on the fly based on how guys’ style is changing."

http://www.fastcocreate.com/3055416/behind-the-brand/why-axe-is-toning-down-the-bro-and-aiming-to-reflect-modern-masculinity

Future of food

Powdered food has been gaining some traction over the past few years with the introduction of brands such Huel, Soylent and Ambronite. Will these brands become mainstream in 2016 and beyond?

And with the advances in DNA analysis with companies such as 23andme (https://www.23andme.com/en-gb/) will food become increasingly tailored to our genetic needs.

http://www.nesta.org.uk/2016-predictions/sticky-sweet-future-food-hacking?gclid=CLuM6J6XlcoCFQsEwwod9d8BIg