For its Amazone champagne, Palmer & Co has unveiled a folding box sporting bas-relief in a decor designed by Ethicpack and manufactured by Le Sanglier. The French-made pack’s vine leaf motif is complemented by an imitation label with touches of black and gold hot stamping.
Palmer & Co is the first brand to opt for Ethicpack’s Sculpturbox* folding box for its Amazone champagne. A newly founded design agency specialized in sustainable packaging, Ethicpack went for a “less is more” approach. “Our idea was to highlight the play of light on the relief of the décor, and thus be able to reduce the use of inks and gilding,” designer Klaus J. Graeber, co-founder of Ethicpack, tells Luxe Packaging Insight.
The folding box (Le Sanglier) is made of 750g FibreForm Board; Swiss company Kapag converts Swedish papermaker BillerudKornäs’ FibreForm paper using a patented process to create FibreForm Board. The sculpted surface decor, with its vine motifs recalling the chalky hillsides of Reims, cradle of champagne production, is done in bas-relief using tools from French decoration specialist Créanog. “To our knowledge, this is the first time bas-relief has been used in packaging,” affirms Graeber. For the designer, the challenge lay in achieving a bas-relief that traverses the cardboard – the material is pressed with a weight of 600 tons.
Plant-based inks are used for the text on the back of the pack, while an imitation label on the facing is embellished with minimal hot stamping (Kurz) in gold and black. The hot stamped area represents less than 0.2% of the whole pack, and the box is free from magnets, glue and film, making it recyclable in standard paper streams and even suitable for industrial composting.
In a bid to give the folding box “the volume of a coffret”, the brand chose a format that was slightly bigger than a standard champagne box. This called for a specific insert to hold the bottle in place, which is also made of FibreForm Board. “The eco-design has allowed for a considerable reduction in volume and transportation, and results in a cost reduction of 50% compared to the previous generation box,” Graeber concludes.
*Ethicpack has trademarked the Sculpturbox packaging concept, which it is making available to other brands.
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