Here’s a handful of the many we’ve covered throughout the year.
Christian Louboutin’s Tape à l’Oeil (eye-catching) Eye Colour collection is a pigment-rich eye color range designed to stun. “To me, eye colour is parure pour les yeux. It is jewelry for the eyes,” says Louboutin. The formulas are encased in a clear vial adorned with a gold fluted shell that references Byzantine and Art Déco motifs, two époques that Christian often revisits in his work. This objet d’art is topped with a slender weighted cap that is reminiscent of Christian’s iconic Nail Color design. Similar to a calligraphy brush, the cap rests comfortably in the hand, ensuring a controlled and precise application experience.
Avon Products launched True 5-in-1 Lash Genius Mascara - and the brand says it "answers social media's most-shared lash wishes," dictated by the Genius Algorithm—an exclusive machine learning and artificial intelligence tool. The tool reads, filters, processes and ranks thousands of online consumer comments, and determined the top features they crave in a mascara. The mascara combines a high-tech multi-action brush and a smart control gel formula infused with deep carbon-black pigments that are both buildable and lightweight. The short bristles quickly load the formula onto lashes from root to tip and corner to corner to deliver the Internet's No. 1 benefit, dramatic multi-dimensional volume, and the comb grabs the lashes to lengthen, lift and separate each one of them.
Olay’s Limited Edition Face Moisturizer includes 1 full jar and 1 refill pod that can be placed in the jar once emptied—and was a huge advance for mass market packaging. Plus—this refill pod eliminates 94% of plastic jar waste. And since it’s not only about doing good, this unique moisturizer actively hydrates to smooth fine lines and even tone for younger-looking skin. This fragrance-free moisturizer is formulated with Vitamin B3 plus Carob Extract and Vitamin E.
Myro illustrates how a decoration can tell a brand’s story. The new innovative deodorant brand sold at Target, has a refillable case, and a variety of scented pod refills. The refills are sold in cartons, decorated with a design that truly elevates the brand. Each carton is designed to visually convey each fragrance. Yael Eisele, Myro’s creative director, and partner at Deerfield, a boutique agency in Brooklyn, explains, “We approached the narrative around each scent in a way that’s more typical of fine fragrance, crafting stories that people can make emotional connections to online—a format that clearly doesn't allow for smelling product. The pod boxes rely more on visuals than romance copy to tell our scent stories. Mood-inspiring snapshots on each package support the scent names.”
Italian perfume house, Masque Milano has unveiled a duo of luxury unisex fragrances inspired “by the dynamism and various acts of the opera.” Kintsugi is inspired by a Japanese art, of the same name, in which broken pottery is repaired with a lacquer mixed with precious metals. The thought: “Cherish the simple. Cherish the old. Do not hide your scars, show them with pride.” Love Kills imagines perfumer Caroline Dumur on the stage of an opera, “with the spotlight on the quintessential flower of love: her majesty the Rose,” and the flower’s beautiful notes.
Thinking outside the bottle: Metapack worked with the Diptyque brand to create this scented ribbon dispenser—the first scented ribbon dispenser made by a perfume brand. The dispenser is 100% made in France. It combines three parts made of Zylar and two parts made of PP. The blade and weight are made of steel. The manual assembly has been done by a workshop employing disabled persons, so in addition to being an innovative project, this item also highlights CSR.
To sync with The Lion King movie, celebrity makeup artist, Sir John, and Luminess Cosmetics collaborated on a makeup collection featuring highly pigmented formulas with colors curated from the African landscape. The rich formulas come together in hand-designed layered packaging, inspired by the iconic scenes and characters from the film. The packaging is a combination of a metallized coating to give the rose gold finish, followed by different color pigments that are 3D printed in layers, with etched relief in other areas revealing the metallized rose gold. The result is a package design that is layered with hundreds of shapes, in nearly a dozen color shades to create one incredibly tactile design.
The jar for Kiehl’s Pure Vitality Skin Renewing Cream is topped with an innovative dispensing material that enables the consumer to “push” droplets of the product from the container, while still maintaining the remaining product’s full efficacy. The formula is certified “Silver” by the Cradle to Cradle institute, based on an evaluation of the product’s material health, material reutilization, renewable energy and carbon management, water stewardship and social fairness. The certification acts as a guarantee that the products and materials have been developed to respect human and environmental health, designed for future use cycles, and utilize clean energy and water throughout the supply chain.
All-natural skincare brand Non Gender Specific has launched Flooid ($125), “a clean, genderless, waste-free fragrance.” The plantable carton is made with tree-less paper infused with a variety of beautiful, non-invasive, wildflower seeds that vary in color and texture—and even the ink is derived from plants. Each sheet of the packaging is handmade in small batches in a California manufacturing facility that runs on 100% wind energy.
Luxe Brands partnered with Cosmopolitan to launch a ‘pop art inspired’ fragrance line called Eau de Juice—and the bottles look like juice containers. The fragrance collection includes four scents, in an innovative bottle designed to look like a juice drink container—complete with a straw (with a lip print). The bottles are decorated in four "Instagrammable shades"—metallic gold, glossy white, soft-touch blue and “Millennial pink.”
Prestige Korean brand Dear Dahlia, available in the U.S., features the patented Dahlia Flower Extract in all of their products. Dear Dahlia’s octagonal-shaped packaging represents the Dahlia flower in full bloom. Known as the “Queen of the Garden” the flower is representative of one-of-a-kind beauty within each person. The marble and pink-gold design conveys timeless style, representing prestige and luxury.
Designed by architect and industrial designer Chafik Gasmi, the Lancôme Idole Eau de Parfum bottle is one of the slimmest in the world at just 15mm thick—and “a fitting tribute to the industry technical advances and innovations,” according to the brand. Available in several refillable formats (25-, 50- and 75ml), Idôle is accompanied by a perfume fountain at selected points of sale. The technical challenges are multiple: the bottle is exceedingly slim, geometrically faced with extremely uniform glass distribution, and the walls of the bottle are so fine that the packaging becomes practically invisible to the benefit of the perfume. The edges of the bottle are decorated with metal brackets applied by gluing, or in the case of the 25ml size, partially lacquered. Bormioli Luigi makes the 50- and the 25ml bottles.
Comme des Garçons says Copper is “an olfactive interrogation of perceived differences and their harmonious alignment.” In this fragrance, chemically synthesized metals underscore natural notes. It’s held within a copper vessel, organically formed and industrially made.
