Interaction Design · Project 1 of 3 · Weeks 1–5
Package Design Project 2: Material is the Message
What does your packaging say before it is opened?
FORMAT
Archived — past iteration, replaced by Less / Forever
WEEKS
4–7
METHODS
Material research · Haptic and sensory analysis · Structural prototyping · Adobe Illustrator · Surface graphic design · Digital mockup · Iterative critique
TAGS
Package Design, Sustainability, Design Education, Design Thinking
Why this project
Material is the Message draws from Marshall McLuhan's idea that the medium influences the message — that the container isn't neutral and that the way something is presented alters its meaning. In packaging design, this is literal: a glass bottle communicates differently than a plastic one, even with identical contents. The project asked students to make this distinction clear and intentional.
The project encouraged strong material exploration. Students using unusual materials like reconstituted paper pulp or seed-embedded board created memorable work and showed genuine curiosity about materials. However, curiosity alone isn't enough; material reasoning is different. For example, a student choosing seed-embedded board because it’s interesting demonstrates a different understanding than one who can explain its lifecycle, compostability, cost, and biodegradation conditions. While the project rewards interesting material choices, it didn't always require an understanding of the reasoning behind those choices.
Less / Forever addresses this by integrating analysis into the project. Students must pick a focus—either radical reduction or cradle-to-cradle lifecycle—and justify it in a written memo before starting their designs. The lifecycle diagram makes their material reasoning explicit and assessable. The project continues to value curiosity about materials but emphasizes that such curiosity must be backed by knowledge.
The Brief
PROJECT PROMPT
Choose a material — paperboard, bioplastic, fabric, corrugated board, metal, glass, or another with the instructor’s approval — and design packaging for a product that the material itself helps communicate. The material is not a neutral container. It has weight, texture, opacity, rigidity, flexibility, and environmental history. Your design must make those properties meaningful.
Research the material before designing with it. Understand how it is made, how it behaves, its cost, and what happens to it after use.
DELIVERABLE
Material research documentation: sourcing, properties, environmental impact
Material samples: physical or photographed examples submitted with proposal
Structural sketches and prototypes
Final prototype using chosen material with applied surface graphics
Digital mockup
Material rationale: written statement connecting material choice to product and brand values
Self-assessment — see separate assignment sheet
What I've learned from running this
Material is the Message was a project that produced formally diverse and often surprising work. The monoprint and texture work that some students incorporated gave the surface graphics a material specificity that purely digital work rarely achieves.
The project did not consistently ensure that students understood their materials. For instance, a student who selected a seed-embedded board because it looked attractive and sustainable had a different level of understanding than one who could explain its composting conditions, supply chain, and cost differences compared to standard boards. Although the brief requested material research, this research was not incorporated into a structured analytical framework that could be evaluated during critique. Typically, the critique question was: does this seem like a well-chosen material? It should have been: can you justify why this material is the best choice for this product and its lifecycle?
Less / Forever channels that enthusiasm into a more structured framework. The two-path approach — Less or Forever — provides students with a clear analytical stance to defend. The path selection memo, due and approved before the design process starts, clarifies the argument early on. The lifecycle diagram reveals the underlying reasoning, encouraging critique and discussion. This project is more challenging than Material is the Message. It results in work that is more thoroughly reasoned.