Applications: Lofty Design
The bottle for KenzoAir takes its cue from the sky—and a glass sculpture.
By Jennifer Kwok, Managing Editor
The bottle for KenzoAir men's eau de parfum is a soaring achievement. Comprised of seven individual components, it was challenging to produce and assemble.
Kenzo Parfums (Paris) sought a bottle design that would feel airy, like "a sliver of sky." To this end, the square-shaped bottle's opaque white walls simulate clouds. Behind the walls is a polypropylene sheet tinted in blue shades to resemble the sky.
The design was conceived by Raphaëlle Raymond, senior product manager for Kenzo Parfums, and Patrick Guedj, creative director for Kenzo Parfums. It was inspired by a work by Italian glass sculptor Laura de Santillana.
Raymond and Guedj began designing a bottle that married glass and plastic. "The glass became purely an element of decoration, instead of being the primary container for the fragrance," says Raymond.
The square polypropylene bottle was blow-molded by Alcan Packaging Techpack. The front and sides of the bottle are covered by a panel of thick, frosted glass produced by Saint-Gobain Desjonquères (La Granja, Spain). The bottle's back is covered with a PCTA panel molded by Alcan Packaging Techpack. The thin blue polypropylene sheet was thermoformed by Tepor & AT Packaging (Montmirail, France). Achieving an accurate blue color for the decorative polypropylene sheet took tinkering, says Raymond.
Creating the thick glass panel was also a challenge. To mold the piece, Saint-Gobain Desjonquères used a method of pressing the glass that had previously been used mainly to create jars or perfume-bottle caps.
"The Spain division of Saint-Gobain Desjonquères had to adjust its constraints to match the strict dimensions we required, in order to allow the pieces to be assembled together correctly," says Raymond. She adds that this job was even more difficult because the design called for the glass to be molded with an uneven, wavy surface. To give the glass its slightly opaque look, it was frosted first, then polished.
The package includes a spray-through pump by Valois (Marly-le-Roi, France), and an actuator from Alcan Packaging Techpack.
Careful design and engineering were needed to assemble KenzoAir's package components into one stunning unit. Alcan Packaging Techpack assembled all of the package's parts and did the filling. "New assembly machines were created specifically for this project," says Raymond. "Alcan Packaging Techpack also developed for KenzoAir a specific glue formula for polymerization by UV rays." During the gluing process, allowances had to be made for the high tolerances of the glass, to ensure that the plastic bottle would fit precisely with the glass piece.
The fragrance began rolling onto shelves worldwide this September. It initially launched in November 2003 in France and Italy. To house the bottle, supplier Autajon produced a carton that was offset-printed in four colors, including two PMS colors for the logo and the text.
Looking back, Raymond says the biggest feat was probably the assembly process. "The most challenging aspect was definitely performing the assembly of so many different parts, and especially fitting the glass and plastic pieces together," she says. "We had numerous meetings with technicians from all of the manufacturing companies involved."
One thing is certain. The bottle certainly helps take the men's fragrance shelf to new heights.