Second Year Cardiff School of Art & Design students have developed and designed sustainable packaging for successful Welsh food brand The Parsnipship, which forms part of their coursework and will be seen soon on retailer shelves.
The live design brief from the Bridgend-based vegetarian and vegan food manufacturer specified that the product packaging should incorporate sustainable and recyclable materials to align with the company's eco-friendly ethos.
The Parsnipship has won Great Taste awards for their Glamorgan Crumble and Tandoori Mash-Up and regularly calls on the University's ZERO2FIVE Food Industry Centre for support, including employing a sales and marketing affiliate through the EU-funded Project HELIX. On this occasion, ZERO2FIVE referred The Parsnipship to Cardiff School of Art & Design for assistance.
Twelve teams of students worked on the six-week project, which included investigating the current packaging market, selecting appropriate sustainable materials and developing a range of suitable concepts.
As part of their research, the students used the University's high tech Perceptual Experience Laboratory to visualise how their designs would look in a retail environment and then professionally pitched their final costed designs to the company.
Neave Thorne, India Wynn, Mariam Abdelwahed and Jordan Hewlett were on the winning team and were selected for their quirky design which reflected The Parsnipship brand.
The winning design included a window enabling potential purchasers to see the product inside, considered the sustainability of the materials used and suggested local packaging suppliers.
The Parsnipship team has incorporated a number of elements from the winning design into their new packaging which they launched at last week's Taste Wales event, the Welsh Government's international food and drink trade showcase.
Flo Ticehurst, co-owner of The Parsnipship said: "The quality of work was really impressive and it was exciting to see all the designs the teams had come up with. We can't wait to show the winning team how their design has been developed into our new retail packaging. Hopefully they will be pleased to see the results of their hard work on the shelves in the near future."
Neave Thorne, Product Design student, Cardiff Metropolitan University said: "Working with The Parsnipship has given me an insight into working for a real product design company and their clients. Learning about such an original company has opened my eyes to the materials we use as product designers and the options which are available to help the environment."
Dr Clara Watkins, Programme Director of the University's Product Design Department said: "This has been a great experience for our students. The uniqueness of The Parsnipship and the challenges of the live brief encouraged students to think outside the box and resulted in a truly rich student learning experience."
To read this story in Welsh, click here.
Read more about how BA Product Design Student Neave Thorne contributed to this project here.
