For our customers and business partners, we wanted to develop a product that would make our high design standards clear while at the same time inspiring thought. We wanted to put the sustainable approach of our work into context with our role as a packaging agency and our traditionally close ties to Japan. The project was to be realized in a small print run of 2,500 copies and should be shippable without further repackaging as a greeting for the turn of the year 2019/2020.

To raise awareness for the increasing pollution of the oceans, we designed a special product our business partners can use to set an example. We were inspired by the ancient Japanese tradition of wrapping gifts in a furoshiki – a simple cloth that is used and reused again and again, making disposable packaging superfluous.

Our Furoshiki is made from Ocean Plastic. This not only avoids new waste, but also recycles existing waste. And because the cloth is always passed on, it spreads a meaningful idea – gift by gift. On closer inspection, the pattern on the cloth illustrates the location of the floating islands of garbage in the oceans. So the Furoshiki not only makes a small contribution to the regeneration of our planet, it also inspires a moment of reflection.

Our strategy is simple: decoding the pattern of the cloth initiates a process of reflection – that can lead to real behavioral change. At the same time, our Furoshiki proves that sustainable design does not come at the expense of design quality. For our customers in the consumer goods industry, it is a best practice that encourages them to question conventional production processes and make them more eco-friendly.

The Japanese tradition of Furoshiki combines the joy of unwrapping with the serenity of maintaining a good conscience. Our Furoshiki was made from recycled Ocean Plastic. The included poster and greeting card are made from seaweed paper and printed by using an environmentally friendly process called risography which relies on water-based inks made with soy oil. It is not as resource-intensive and requires significantly less energy than conventional printing. Dot-screen printing also uses 30% less ink than full-tone printing.

The Furoshiki shows that high-quality design and sustainable approaches are not mutually exclusive. It thus inspired our customers to find new solutions for their own production processes – and initiated the booking of workshops sessions at the start of the year. Moreover, because a Furoshiki is always passed on, it becomes an advertising medium with a snowball effect. Numerous publications covered the product and helped to increase awareness.