Symbol of knowledge, wisdom, abundance, peace, health, strength and beauty worshiped for thousands of years. A living part of a severe cultural heritage, legends, traditions and religious rituals closely associated with flowering, harvest and production of oil. Such a special heritage should have at least the most special packaging design. And how to convey such tradition in a small bottle and label? Here are some examples, made by Greek designers…
CREATED BY SPEIRON COMPANY, DESIGNED BY CORINNA MICHAELIDOU
Λ /LAMBDA/ ULTRA PREMIUM OLIVE OIL
The first luxury olive oil in the world.
It is the premium choice of A-listers and well-heeled socialites from Beverly Hills to Singapore. Chef Juan Mari Arzak – the 8th best in the world for 2008 according to Restaurant magazine – found it “marvellous” and Tom Aikens – the 8th best chef for 2005 – has been using it for its “unrivalled fruity taste”. The LA Times called it “brilliant”, and Wallpaper* magazine nominated it “peak performer”. /lambda/ is the first luxury olive oil in the world, produced by Speiron, the Greek pioneering Luxury Food & Beverage Company.
As Times UK said λ /lambda/ is “one man’s quest for olive oil perfection”. From some of the oldest olive oil trees of Greece, the finest Koroneiki olives are handpicked and pressed with utmost care. This creates an olive oil of ultra-low acidity (0,26º), unfiltered, rich in phenols and full of freshness and fruitiness. Then this precious liquid is being bottled and labelled entirely by hand, bottle by bottle, in a slow procedure in order to ensure minimum oxidation and maximum attention to detail.
The glass bottle is sticker free to display the colour of the oil and it is presented in a gift box with a unique PVC information leaflet. The customer can have his/hers signature embossed on bottle along with a special marking on the shoulder of the bottle. 8 great craftsmen join their forces for 30 days to create a stunning white lacquered handcrafted case made of solid niangon wood that bears two 18k white gold plates. The item is accompanied by a certificate of exclusivity as well as a certificate of exceptional quality.
The briefing (in brief): “we offer a premium quality product and we want a premium quality visual differentiation”. The target audience: an international high-end consumer. The design: this packaging is deliberately and in every possible way moving away from traditional vessels and symbols of olive oil quality or clichés of provenance. This pack design targets the cultivated mind of a food connoisseur who has the spirit of an aesthete: on a metallic can which speaks of function and culinary power, a very realistic-looking drop of oil, comes, almost as an afterthought, in order to keep the product safely grounded into the food section of every selling point. If ever there was a slogan attached to it, then this would read ‘simply oil’.
The briefing (in brief): “we market our premium product abroad and mainly in the Far East, where it is considered a cosmetic, aside from being consumed as a precious food item”. The target audience: consumers who appreciate pure ingredients and the rituals relating to their consumption. The design: targeting a cultural milieu with very specific communication semiotics and particular habits, we opted for a design which, subliminally, speaks about archetypes, about the signs and symbols of the oldest civilizations. Product
of an ancient land and a sacred plant, the ‘etesian gold oil’ is saved in an elegant bottle. It is sealed with the graphic symbol, used in linear b (an ancient greek pre-alphabet syllabic script) to mean ‘olive’. Color tones and hues are kept to the minimum of an earthly palette.
The briefing (in brief): “we are targeting a selective and well informed clientele, abroad. We want to stress the special qualities of our product”. The design: since our client wanted to avoid having a ‘provenance-oriented’ identity, we turned to the area of basic human aspirations. Creating the product’s identity, we resorted to a singular combination of metaphysics and humor. We used the term “St. Olive”, not in a religious context, but as an attempt to bring forward the chthonic, primary, life-giving character of the oil fruit. Design helped us make this approach more concrete and acute: it placed a hand – the very representation of the spiritual and the divine- within the area of the ritual, the human and the feasible. In this way humor allowed for process to emerge as the care needed to make things great. We even collaborated with a painter specializing in byzantine iconography, in order to be faithful to the codes of the symbolic language we chose. It was our way to confirm once more what we believe is on the basis of every communication: everything, from the simple to the complicated, is “a leap of faith’ and one there is no reason to take without being well prepared.
100% GREEK EXTRA VIRGIN AND ORGANIC OLIVE OILS
The briefing (in brief): “we want labels for extra virgin and organic olive oils”. The target audience: consumers with respect for pure products in foreign markets (U.S.A., Canada, Japan). The design: to convey the contemporary significance and ultimate value of an age old product of the greek land, to foreign audiences and cultures, was our primary task and concern. The absolute purity of the product offered a graphic vehicle in the form of the hundrent percent symbol. The olive tree fruit, with its almost circular, mythically fertile flesh, completed the visual; the design carried smoothly a simple message to the viewer/consumer: full, bare, extra, organic, bottled purity. The colors, clear and eartlhy, convey as musch as possible, this ‘direct’ experience of the product.
DESIGNED BY DESIGNERSUNITED
Brand identity and packaging design for a new premium quality series of Greek extra virgin olive oil. 5 stands for quintessence in olive oil.
DESIGNED BY BOB STUDIO
Company’s identity and olive oil packaging applications’ design, including glass bottles, metallic tins, wooden box and press presentation material design. The concept of the design idea comes from the process of protecting olive trees from bugs by painting them on the bottom part with white protection paint.
An anniversary packaging for an olive oil, a tribute to the 29th Athens Classic Marathon, that took place in Athens, Greece, on the 13th of November 2011.
A line-drawing of an ancient Greek runner was made, in a way that it would form a pattern-like continuity. The drawing was then printed on the bottles and when more than one of the bottles were placed next to each other, the drawings gave the impression of the running crowd of the Marathon.
The pattern was further used for other applications, such as t-shirts, calendars and notebooks, as well as the exhibition’s kiosk.
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