Can You Own a Colour?

For my final project at university I asked Pearlfisher (where I was on student placement) to write me a design brief.
They asked me to package Coca Cola for 15 years in the future.

It was a great brief, and I came up with loads of ideas, based on what I believed could happen in the not too distant future.

Back at the end of the last century (was it THAT long ago I was at uni?!!), water shortage was only just becoming a recognised potential global problem, so one idea was to design a concentrated Coca Cola, packaged only in the bottom of a cut-off bottle-shaped can, which you then have to dilute yourself (if you can find water!)

Genetically modifying food was also a new development, so another idea was that Coca Cola would genetically engineer their own fruit, to look like an orange (but red of course) with cola coloured segments that tasted of Coca Cola.

Next was Global warming - such a nuisance when you want a nice cold can of your favourite sugar-based global-domineering soda. The solution? a solar-panelled can that generates energy to cool the contents of course!

OK, so 15 years have passed and none of these have gone into production (thankfully).

However, another idea I had was that Coca Cola would own the rights to the colour red! so no red tomatoes allowed, and no red flowers, ladybirds, buses, post boxes, lipstick, clothes... so the only time you ever saw red it HAD to mean Coca Cola.
For the pack I didn't even need a logo, it was simply a red can with an ® symbol in the corner.
Then I saw this slightly disconcerting story in Design Week yesterday:
http://www.designweek.co.uk/news/cadbury-wins-exclusive-use-of-pantone-2685c-purple/3035336.article

The future it seems may well be orange, but only for Orange™. Surely brand legal departments the world over are now hastily applying for ownership of their particular Pantone colour?
Restricting times ahead for us brand designers I think.

UPDATE: The Nestlé Empire Strikes Back! (thankfully) http://www.designweek.co.uk/news/cadbury-loses-legal-fight-over-rights-to-pantone-2685c-purple/3037307.article?cmptype=Exxon%20and%20FXX%20in%20legal%20row%20over%20interlocking%20Xs,%20Cadbury%20loses%20Pantone%202685c%20purple%20fight,%20Children's%20Illustrated%20Classics%20at%20the%20British%20Library%20and%20more...&cmpid=dwnews_14902

A Christmas stocking-filler for the planet?

Waitrose have been selling clementines in cardboard boxes rather than plastic nets over Christmas - OK the structure and amount of board may be a BIT excessive, but a good start. Surely this can be developed across almost all fruit currently in plastic netting AND hard plastic punnets?? I do hope so.

Gorgeous recycled old rubbish: Andrea Garland vintage tins...

Happened upon these lovely reused vintage tins in Liberty recently, now refilled with body balms, lip balms & sore muscle rubs. And once it's finished you can send it back to be refilled again.
Admittedly they ARE a tad pricey at around 30 pounds each, but you DO get a lovely antique to keep. And the refills are less than half the original price.

More here:

http://andreagarland.co.uk/#/vintage-range/4528891929

Sustainable Business by Design conference

Ok I know it was about two months ago now but here's some of the highlights from the highly inspirational event at Somerset College...

http://www.sustainable-design-uk.com

Brilliantly hosted by the eloquent Andrew Knutt, the day was mostly filled with design industry related speakers, interspersed with breakout sessions by each speaker, giving attendees a chance to discuss chosen topics in smaller groups.

There were presentations from the Design Council, the very amusing & entertaining Mark Shayler of eco3 - http://www.eco3.co.uk - ex Asda Environmental Manager. Good to hear a less serious view on sustainability.

Also speaking were John Boult, John Luff & Lynne Elvins.

My personal favourite however was Peter Hopton of VeryPC - http://www.very-pc.co.uk - and his story of how he got the BroadLeaf PC produced in the most environmental & ethical way humanly possible. From removing harmful chemical flame retardants, asking for the wires not to be individually bagged, to sourcing the Yorkshire chassis manufacturer (using Icelandic Aluminium), all put together in Sheffield.

And it uses half the energy of the greenest big brand option for the same performance, and less energy when asleep than some PC's do when turned off!

A real genuine & humble green genius.

Screw you Apple...

I'd had occasional problems with the scroll ball in my mighty mouse, but had always managed to fix it with some bashing on the desk and upside-down blowing!

However, after a couple of years the mouse finally stopped scrolling completely - no amount of desk-whacking, up-blowing or even feeding with alcohol would bring it back to life.

I tried gently prizing the mouse apart but to no avail, it seems apple don't WANT you to fix them! So, with my refusal to let apple (& consumerism) win, I turned to Google.

...a couple of searches later and I was following a Youtube video (of which there are many) of a helpful chap dissecting, cleaning and reassembling a mighty mouse. Pretty darn easy, though you DO need to 'break' the ring around the bottom and glue it back on afterwards.
It was easy to see why it would no longer scroll - there was thick dirt & fluff stuck to the tiny wheels (see pics below).
The whole process was a little fiddly but it worked perfectly again, just like new, in about 20 minutes.

How many of these plastic mighty mouses have been chucked in landfill so far (and replaced by a new one), when they could have been so easily fixed?

Then today in the news I saw this story of Apple attempting once again to stop customers self-fixing with the introduction of a 'pentalobe' screw:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/01/pentalobe-screw-apple-war.php

Do you want the Good Green News, or the Bad Green News?

Everything I saw today seemed to have a negative impact on our big greeny-blue planet;

From POM taking pomegranate seeds out of their packaging and putting them in packaging;

Britain STILL not taking any action on BPA in food packaging and babies bottles;

Premier Foods changing Sun-Pat Peanut Butter from glass to plastic containers, claiming "the switch to PET helped reduce the product’s carbon footprint." and that "the sustainability and logistics benefits deliver major solutions,” - perhaps major solutions for those huge holes in the ground that need filling? and for increasing their profit margin with a switch to cheap throw-away plastic jars rather than easily recyclable glass.

http://www.pomwonderful.com/products/freshfruit/pom-wonderful-arils/

http://www.packagingnews.co.uk/news/materials/france-and-denmark-ban-bisphenol-a-from-babies-bottles

http://www.packagingnews.co.uk/news/premier-foods-moves-sun-pat-from-glass-to-pet-containers

...THEN I stumbled across this great 15 minute special from Stella Artois, part of their Recyclage de Luxe campaign, which put me back in a good green mood again!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwYCFnIo5FI

Bonnes nouvelles vertes!!

Green paint? or Greenwash?

Dulux (ICI) recently launched a range of 'Eco' Low VOC paints (only Matt paint seems to be VOC free), all packaged in lovely disposable plastic!

Very little information is given on their website about levels of Volotile Organic Compounds, or how the paint is produced, so it hard to get excited about this move:

http://www.icipaints.co.uk/products/ecosure/index.jsp