Fragrance Bottles: Hip Styles
Bond No. 9 New York’s new Saks Fifth Avenue bottle features the retailer’s redesigned logo.Today’s fragrance bottle designs are being inspired by pop art, 1960s mod styles, and sleek colorful iPods—all in an effort to look modern.
By Marie Redding, Senior EditorThe desire to give fragrance bottles a modern look seems to be a common goal of designers this year. Bond No. 9 New York’s new bottle designs have been described as mod and hip, while the Perry Ellis and Nina Ricci brands both modernized the look of their fragrance packaging to attract a new type of customer.
New Partnerships Drive New Designs
Bond No. 9 New York uses its signature bottle shape for every fragrance. The glass bottle, which resembles a star, is meant to represent the shape of a person. The bottle is produced by Bormioli Luigi (Horsham, PA) and is decorated differently for each new launch. Bond No. 9 formed two new partnerships this year. These new alliances inspired new bottle décor. “If anyone comes to us with an idea and there is a connection with New York, then we’re interested,” says Laurice Rahmé, president of Bond No. 9 New York.
The first new partnership for Bond No. 9 New York was with Saks Fifth Avenue. Bond No. 9 created a fragrance that launched exclusively in Saks Fifth Avenue stores in September. The signature bottle’s decoration features abstract imagery resembling modern art and comprises parts of Saks Fifth Avenue’s new logo, which was introduced last January.
Michael Beirut of Pentagram Design created Saks Fifth Avenue’s new logo. Beirut based the new logo on the logo designed by Massimo Vignelli in 1973. The 1973 logo featured the Saks Fifth Avenue name written in ornate script inside a square box. Beirut updated this design and enlarged it. He divided the blown-up lettering into 64 square boxes and arranged them in a multitude of combinations to create different designs for different merchandise—such as the pattern featured on Bond No. 9 New York’s new fragrance bottle.
The design is silk-screened on the bottle by USS Corp. (Newark, NJ). “It required a tremendous amount of passes—five on each side,” says Bob DeProspo, executive vice president, sales and marketing, for USS Corp. “We had to make sure that the black wouldn’t bleed onto the white. We used a proprietary process in order to do this,” says DeProspo.
Rahmé feels that partnering with Saks Fifth Avenue was the perfect way to expand her New York City neighborhood theme, which has inspired the names and juices of all her past fragrances. “Fifth Avenue is the best shopping neighborhood in New York and one of the best in the world. It’s an area of the city that I didn’t already have a fragrance named after, so this was a great opportunity,” she says.
Pop Art
Bond No. 9’s Andy Warhol bottle was inspired by the artist’s Campbell’s Soup painting.
Another one of Bond No. 9 New York’s unexpected alliances this year was with The Andy Warhol Foundation, a nonprofit organization that supports visual arts programs for children. The Foundation asked Rahmé if she wanted to create a Warhol-inspired fragrance collection.
“Andy Warhol is a New York icon, so the partnership made sense,” says Rahmé. The first fragrance in a series of collectible bottles is launching in October. It is named The Silver Factory. “The Silver Factory was Warhol’s studio and a legendary place in New York,” Rahmé explains.
Warhol’s iconic Campbell’s Soup painting was used as inspiration for the bottle’s decoration. Rahmé was excited about creating this bottle. “We even replicated some of the colors Warhol used. It’s my first pop-art perfume,” she says.
The metallic silver bottle is reminiscent of the silver floor and walls in Warhol’s studio. Rahmé also likes the silver because the color is very much in fashion this fall and can be found on everything from bags to shoes. “The silver was extremely challenging. It had to look fashionable, with the right amount of shine,” she explains. Hanes (Fairview, PA) applies the silver textured finish onto the glass bottles, and the colorful label is printed and applied by Paris Art Label (Ronkonkoma, NY).
Influenced by iPod
The clean, sleek shapes of iPod digital music players have inspired countless designs—and their influence continues.
With their sleek metal sleeves, Perry Ellis’s new fragrance bottles are designed to appeal to the iPod generation.
The fragrances Perry Ellis 18 for men and women launched last April. Falic Fashion Group, licensor of the Perry Ellis brand name, describes the new fragrances as modern interpretations of the brand’s classic ones. The company wanted the packaging for these fragrances to attract a younger, urban consumer, according to Denis Boudard. Boudard is president of design agency QSLD New World (Paris), whose U.S. division in Clearwater, FL, designed the packaging. The firm used a combination of materials, including metal, to achieve a look that is appealing to the iPod generation.
The glass bottles are rectangular-shaped and supplied by Bormioli Luigi. The women’s juice is pink and the men’s is blue. The fragrances can be seen through the clear sides of the bottles. The front and back of the bottles are covered by colored metal sleeves.
“The brushed-metal sleeve naturally envelopes the bottle, while reflecting the color of the juice inside. The contrast between the glass bottle and the metal sleeve creates a new tactile experience,” Boudard explains.
The secondary packaging reflects the bottle’s curved shape and gives the brand a strong shelf presence. Overall, the packaging has a contemporary feel and an edge that will attract a younger consumer to the brand.
Reinterpreting a Classic
Nina Ricci’s new bottle resembles the shape of an antique Lalique crystal bottle used for Ricci’s Fille d’Eve fragrance in 1952.
A bottle designed in the 1950s was the inspiration for a new bottle shape created for the Nina by Nina Ricci fragrance, which launched in August. The apple-shaped bottle resembles the shape of a Lalique crystal bottle used for Nina Ricci’s Fille d’Eve fragrance in 1952.
“We wanted this package to have a connection with the brand but also have a fresh, modern image to attract a new, younger consumer,” says Margerie Barbes Petit, brand director, Nina Ricci Fragrance Division.
Indentations on the top of the bottle give the bottle a more realistic apple shape. The bottle’s sunken neck required that the minimum tolerance of the collar be adjusted to the tolerance of the glass.
The glass is a translucent pinkish-red achieved by a lacquering process. It has a darker spot of color, or “blush mark,” which gives the decoration a subtle depth. This “flash” of color is applied using a specially developed process and is done on a random spot on each bottle, making each bottle unique. Pochet (Wayne, NJ) and Saint-Gobain Desjonquéres (New York City) both produce the bottles. Pochet supplies a 30-ml, an 80-ml, and a miniature size; Saint-Gobain Desjonquéres supplies the 50-ml bottle.
Qualipac of America (Wayne, NJ) supplies the band and created the silver leaf shapes around the bottle’s neck. The company found a way to produce this piece as a single clip-on part, rather than the two parts it would have normally required. The unique shade of silver is meant to resemble white gold and has a glossy—but not mirrored—finish. MeadWestvaco Calmar (Grandview, MO) and Valois of Amercia (Congers, NY) supply the pumps for the various bottle sizes.
Staying Modern
Nina Ricci’s marketing team was happy with the new bottle design and feels that the brand has successfully reinvented its image for a new consumer. The desire to become more modern is also what inspired positive changes for Bond No. 9’s Saks Fifth Avenue fragrance and its new logo design.
Taking advantage of the availability of new materials and production processes and combining materials in new ways is what Boudard says helped create a truly innovative package for Perry Ellis’s new fragrances. “The real trick is to anticipate what your consumer expects and to deliver it at just the right time. As your customer evolves, so must your brand,” Boudard advises.