The specialist papermaker and colour expert James Cropper spoke to 500 designers about what’s driving colour trends in the modern context. Here are six themes that came out as crucial for the future of colour. Mark Starrs, Master Colour Blender at James Cropper says “Palettes are now progressive, political, environmental, and as ever, personal.” James Cropper’s PROGRESSIVE PALETTES REPORT will be free and released in full at the LuxePack Monaco event in October 2019, as well as being available to pre-order here from May 2019. It will include insights from leading peers, customers and industry experts across a range of topics exploring the modern context of colour.

Sustainability

For 80% of designers, sustainability is having an impact on colour trends. It’s therefore no surprise that the plastic crisis is the thing that resonates the most amongst designers (73%). Sustainability goals was a key consideration for three quarters (76%) of creatives when it comes to choosing colour, and a fifth (20%) predict that in the next ten years the impact of sustainability on colour trends will grow.

The impact of ecommerce 

Just under two in five designers (38%) agree that colour is key to creating a brilliant customer experience with online purchases, believing that the packaging replaces the in-store purchasing experience.

Globalisation 

A third of designers (35%) agree that the need to take cultural influences into account means that brands are moving towards a palette of colours to allow for more fluidity. A third (33%) also agree that colour consistency across markets matters more for luxury brands than for high street brands. Whilst the majority confirm (79%) that achieving colour consistency across regions greatly affects the design process.

Instagram-ability 

On average, 34% of briefs that designers receive include the requirement for the design to be ‘Instagram-able’, citing characteristics of this to be about colours that stand out, are trend setting, distinctive, bright, bold and consistent with branding.

Colour and storytelling 

Almost half (44%) of designers agree that colour is essential to effective storytelling, and that effective storytelling requires more than just one colour. Perhaps indicating a trend away from a set palette, a third (36%) of designers agree that new brands are much less tied to set colours, instead favouring brand stories.

Colour in a digital world 

Almost half (45%) of designers agree the digital world has allowed brands to play with colour, mix things up and tailor brand experiences for particular markets or sectors, opening up a world of opportunity because things can be so easily changed (43%).

Hinoki is a beautiful sustainable packaging concept created for the cosmetics industry. It’s designed by Swedish innovation agency NINE. NINE is a future-driven innovation consultancy, part of the BillerudKorsnäs Group, a publicly traded company and global provider of smarter packaging for a sustainable future.

CHALLENGE: In the Cosmetics Industry, the notion of  “premium” products is commonly connected to the “little extras” on the packaging. Many times, this extra packaging is not entirely necessary and only used during a limited time and then simply discarded. For Hinoki, we wanted to create a sustainable packaging range that is premium, respectful to the planet and a true game-changer in the world of packaging.

SOLUTION: Hinoki is a range of travel-size packaging made out of biodegradable paper for organic skin care products. It’s a concept based on simplicity, single-origin, and respect for the renewable material applied to a currently quite un-sustainable packaging category. The structural design of Hinoki is inspired by the form-language of origami as a means of being true to the value of the material. Each container uses a single piece of laminated paper, folded and pressed into shape, with a tear-off corner revealing a Hinoki wood twist cap.

RESULT: The result is a tactile and natural skin care range with premium value, coming not from artificial inflation, but rather an honest representation and respect for the value of both packaging materials and product experience. The concept is based on existing material and technology. It is currently in the process of being up-scaled. NINE together with Billerud Korsnäs will invite one brand owner partner, in a first mover ambition to develop concepts together with us for sustainable solutions projected to be on the market within 24-36 months.