Jessica Zhengjia Hu · CLIENT: No.72 Design Studio
This project is a series of Blue-and-white tin cans for tea packaging. The main decorations on the sides are mountain and cloud figures resembling the style of Chinese ink wash landscape paintings. By combining traditional patterns with modern graphic elements, abstract lines and geometric shapes are blended into traditional art styles, providing refreshing features for the cans. The tea names in traditional Chinese Xiaozhuan calligraphy are made into embossed seals on top of the lid handles. They are the highlights which make the cans more like real artworks in some way.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- In this project, the major designs are tin cans with blue and white colors and features resembling the Chinese traditional ink wash painting of landscapes. On top of the lid handles are embossed seals of the name of each tea. These seals are made of Xiaozhuan, a traditional calligraphy style from the Qin Dynasty. The major landscape images on the sides are mountains and clouds. With the ideas that tea grows in the mountains, and clouds express the peaceful and relaxing feelings that tea brings us. Traditional Chinese patterns and modern graphic elements are blended into the concept of ink wash painting. With abstract lines and geometric shapes, modern elements combine with traditional Chinese art styles, providing refreshing features for the packaging works. In addition to the tin cans, hexagonal outer boxes are designed under the same concept features and methods. The outer boxes are a set of external packages for the tin cans as well.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- The tin can body dimension is 85mm x 85mm x 120mm, and the dimension of the lid is 75mm x 75mm x 33mm. The handle is a 25mm cubic. The external outer hexagonal box's dimension is about 112mm x 112mm x150mm.
- Tags
- tea, tin can, tea canister, tea container, Blue-and-white porcelain, Chinese, tea culture, ink wash painking, traditional Chinese pattern, Chinese style
- Production Technology
- Blue-and-white porcelain and Chinese ink wash painting are two widely known representatives of Chinese art culture. Indeed, many ancient porcelain pieces were decorated with ink-wash style images. In this project, I am trying to interpret this traditional style in a more creative way. So I applied more abstract shapes and lines in the landscapes figures, while maintaining traditional styled patterns as supplemental details. In this way, I wish to find a balance between traditional arts and modern styles.
- Design Challenge
- Designing practical, functional, and artistic tea packaging is a basic purpose. The actual challenge of this project is the interaction between traditional art forms and modern creative styles. Combining different forms of traditional cultures is my first attempt. The important part is to make balance between all these art cultures so they will not be separated or taking over each other. Furthermore, I need solve these following questions. How to blend in modern elements smoothly? How to interpret these styles in more creative and appealing ways? How to build up relationships and connections between the past and the future? And finally how to transform these ideas into reality so people can get the essence and beauty of the tea, porcelain, ink wash painting, and modern graphic design from the products at the same time.
- Project Duration
- The project started in December 2020 and completed in February 2021 in Shenzhen China.
- Operation Flow
- How to draw customer attention when there are so many selections of the same type of tea products in the market? A classy and attractive package may help a lot in this way. Imitating a Blue-and-white porcelain-liked surface adds deluxe features to the external appearance of the tin cans. In addition, the landscape figures and traditional pattern decorations on the sides emphasize the artistic value of the cans. And the highlight is the traditional Xiaozhuan calligraphy embossed seal on top of the lid handle. This style of seals is frequently used in actual Chinese ink wash paintings and artworks by many traditional artists. Therefore the embossed seals make these tin cans more like real artworks when presenting to the customers. In China, tea is usually associated with art events and cultures. And I hope people can enjoy the beauty within all these Chinese traditional art cultures while relishing the mellow taste of Chinese tea.
- Research
- Chinese Tea Culture has a history of thousands of years. I went through category of different types of tea and selected four popular ones as representatives for my projects: the West Lake Longjing, Tie Guanyin which is a type of Oolong tea, the Biluochun and the Puer Tea. Then I had to associate their origin, tastes and qualities with the shapes and features of ink wash landscape paintings. In addition, I also looked for interesting tea traditions and stories in Chinese history for inspirations. It is said that a scholar in Song Dynasty once compared tea to a friend called Mr Yuchuan in his book. The name Yuchuan was passed on since then. And that was how I came up with the idea of the project name.
- Inspiration
- As native Cantonese, tea drinking is a daily routine of my family. One day I saw a small Blue-and-white porcelain cup while I was trying to open the tea can and make some tea. The inspiration popped up and I thought it would be a good idea to design tea cans which had a Blue-and-white porcelain-liked appearance. They would still be tin cans, but using only blue and white colors and somehow resembling Chinese ink wash painting styles. The purpose is to mimic the look of Blue-and-white porcelain, so the cans can be used as decorative containers for other objects as well. Yuchuan is an alternative name of tea originated from the Song Dynasty in Chinese history. Ming means tea as well, and it is a common preferred name for modern Chinese people.
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