Brand x
Josh Benjamin McDonald Glasgow School of Art Product Design Year 3 2013: jbmcdesign@gmail.com 07894742545
“Create a brand and the products that this brand could provide consumers with for a future trend that you see emerging�
DISCOVER. 03 - 06 Exploring current trends within the area of gardening. What future trends could be emerging in ten years time?
DEFINE. 07 - 12 Selection of future trend to create products and brand for. DEVELOP. 13 - 32 Creation of brand and products. Brand DNA and physical artefacts DELIVER. 33 - 36 Finalization of brand and product as one creating a buyable brand.
MIL STRICEVIC
WATANABE RIE
JOSH BENJAMIN MCDONALD
Mil Stricevic was the tutor for this project throughout and teaches at the Glasgow School of Art. Mil has vast experience in branding and his knowledge helped us create a believable brand and coherent products.
Joining me on this project was Watanabe Rie who was an exchange student from Japan. She was studying at the Glasgow School of Art for one term.
TUTORS/TEAM 01
SAM JOHNSON
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Before development of the brand and products could begin we had to discover a trend that could emerge in ten years. As a group we explored the area of gardening. We wanted to find existing trends within this area to predict future ones.
gardening 03
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To research trends within gardening we examined garden magazines and online material such as blogs and news articles. Upon research we found many trends that already existed from artificial gardening, indoor gardening to gene splicing. Something that we found was common to all the trends was a DIY theme. There was more and more emphasis on growing your own whether, it be fruit or vegetables and so we decided to explore this area more.
trends 05
“Generation Y is not only embracing a new way of learning; they are also redefining what a garden is� + SUSAN HARRIS
+ possible future trends
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+ evening primrose ease the joint pain and swelling
+ european mistletoe, been proven to fight cancer cells
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While researching DIY gardening we came across a television programme called “Grow Your Own Drugs� which was shown on the BBC. The programme showed viewers ways in which they could grow their own drugs in the garden. The recipes were for basic remedies such as aspirin and cold sore creams, all made from organic plants grown in the garden. The programme only lasted for a couple of episodes but as a group we felt that this could become a strong trend in the future.
medicine 08
+ an old chemists
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It was from this that we decided the future trend that we would be designing was for people growing drugs in their garden. Another aspect that brought us to this trend was our prediction that the NHS would not exist in the future. With the economy in turmoil we thought that people would resort to growing their own medication and treating themselves, rather than pay for health care. Home grown medicine is not a new concept with apothecaries creating medicine before the time of pharmaceutical companies.
+ jack greene, apothecary
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touchpoints tone
approach
dna
+ brand dna diagram
To begin with we decided to create the brand. This meant that when it came to designing the products we could design them to relate to the DNA of the brand and communicate as one. Before we could arrive at how the brand would look and feel we had to create the brand DNA. This would ensure that it conveyed clearly what it offered, why and how. To do this we broke our brand down to brand feel, product feel and brand values. We used images that related to each section to convey how the brand should be interpreted.
brand creation
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healing
exclusive elemental
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brand values
boutique
brand feel
purity
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spiritual
calming
minimal
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modern
product feel
+ brainstorm of brand names
logo design
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As our brand was focusing on medicine it was hard not to make the brand feel medicinal. This was something that we wanted to stay away from. By keeping to our brand values and feel we were able to do this. We wanted our brand to be more spiritual and organic and it was important that this was conveyed in the name and logo of the brand. We began by giving our brand a name. Originally we had decided on the name TONIC. However after discussion we felt that it sounded too harsh, it also had strong connotations with gin. Instead we decided to use ESSENCE as we felt it related more to our brand.
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With ESSENCE chosen as the name we then progressed to design the logo. Again it was important that the logo conveyed our brand DNA. We individually designed fifty logos which we put through an elimination process before deciding on one logo which we all agreed on.
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+ rie looking at all of our designs
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essence Holistic Gardening
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“Enhance personal well-being through the use of floral extracts� Our final logo design was inspired by the merge of two worlds, medicine and gardening, which was essentially the purpose of our brand. The leaf in the middle represented the natural element of our brand, as well as the use of the colour green. Fading the lines made it feel less manufactured and the use of lower case text added to this. Overall as a group we felt that the name and logo communicated well together and conveyed our brand.
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+ hydroponic greenhouse, vietnam
As our brand was about offering the user organic, home grown medication we broke the system down into three areas, growing, preparation and consumption. We each took one area and designed a product for it. I was given the area of growing and so began by researching existing and future methods of growing plants. I discovered a growing method called aeroponics, which allows plants to grow without soil. NASA have used this method on space shuttles allowing the astronauts to grow food in space. However the process hasn’t be domesticated. I chose to use this process to grow my product as I felt that it linked to one of our future fictions, that in the future there will be no space for gardens and all vegetables and fruit will be bought or cloned.
product design
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Aeroponics is the process of growing plants in an air or mist environment without the use of soil or an aggregate medium (known as geoponics). The word “aeroponic� is derived from the Greek meanings of aero- (air) and ponos (labour). Aeroponic culture differs from both conventional hydroponics and in-vitro (plant tissue culture) growing. Unlike hydroponics, which uses water as a growing medium and essential minerals to sustain plant growth, aeroponics is conducted without a growing medium. Because water is used in aeroponics to transmit nutrients, it is sometimes considered a type of hydroponics.
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+ net pot used in hydroponic process
Due to time constraints I wasn’t able to make a working prototype of the system. However I made a sketch model and mocked how it would work. To mock the aeroponics system I bought a vase that was similar to the shape I wanted and sprayed it white. My product would function inside the house. The product would respond to touch therefore the user would retain an element of physical contact with the growing process as most of it is maintained by the product. The purpose of my product was to allow users to grow the plants they needed to create the remedies they desired quickly and efficiently from within their home.
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+ spraying the vase with white paint
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To present our work we staged a small exhibition at the New Glasgow Society Club. To go along with our theme of holistic gardening we used synthetic grass to display our work. Collectively we agreed on white and glass as a theme for our products as it emphasized the purity and minimal aspect of our brand. To further explain the brand we produced a small booklet that was presented along side the products. The booklet gave information on the brand and products presenting it as if it was a buyable product.
exhibition
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The thing I enjoyed most about this project was creating the brand. It was something I had never been involved in before. I really enjoyed the whole process. Branding is an area that I am very interested in pursuing as a career therefore I felt being able to create a brand was beneficial to me. However having to create a brand did take up a lot of time which left very little time for the development of the product. However as a group I feel all the products communicated well together.
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