How Molton Brown executed the perfect brief By Vincent Villéger, Luxury Packaging Creative Consultant, @vv_luxurypackaging
here is much negative talk out there about creative misadventures. Tales of poor practices and of fractious client/designer relationships. Nightmare stories of misunderstood visions and dreadful compromise. Today, I would like to offer a controversial, alternative take on this narrative. Today, I would like to tell the story of what happens when everything goes right. I have been saying it to my clients for over twenty years now: my designs will only ever be as good as your brief. As it turns out, Molton Brown came to the table with a near perfect brief. Not by chance. The teams had put a lot of work into establishing what the problem was, without trying to find a solution (that’s my job). The problem in question: the fine fragrance category was not performing to expectations. Presented in the same roundshouldered bottle as the brand’s famous body wash, the fragrances didn’t stand out amidst the wide product offering. The scents were created by master perfumers, using ingredients of the highest quality, but the perfumes just weren’t selling.
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That was the problem. Packaging was the answer. Three key objectives were very clearly set out, against which any design concept would be measured. First, we had to reclaim a luxury positioning for the brand’s fine fragrance category. Then, credibility would need to be established in the fine fragrance market. Finally, the packaging should tell the brand’s story: born in 1970s London, with a progressive outlook characteristic of the period.
The design
I set out to address the bottle silhouette. Creating a form that would stand out amongst the brand’s vast range of products and establish a clear hierarchy between the different product categories. Inspired by 1970s art and visual references, the design borrows from various aspects of the brand’s design language. So, although it stands out, it still
belongs. By turning it into a bold spherical cap, the Lens - one of the brand’s key assets - became the main feature of the bottle. For the Eaux de Parfum, each scent has its own cap colour. This helps with range navigation of course, but more importantly it is an expression of individuality, a concept key to the brand’s approach to scent. The production process means each cap displays unique patterns, so no two bottles are the same. A concave mirrored surface to the top of the bottle creates distorted reflections reminiscent of the psychedelic imagery of the 1970s: a reference to the brand’s origins and an expression of perfume’s unique ability to alter perceptions and create our own reality. To achieve the required level of luxury, I relied on three strategies. First, there’s weight: the glass base is thick, with the shoulders covered
