It’s been a whirlwind few days here in Paris, where 4 of us from the creative team have been continuing the search for inspiration we started in London a week ago. Fortunately inspiration abounds here in Paris, and we’ve found it in every café, store, and gallery we’ve visited.
We timed our Parisian visit to coincide with the Maison et Objet, one
of the world’s largest design and trend shows. From drinking glasses to
furniture, wallpaper to candles, toilets to toothbrushes, it’s all at
Maison et Objet. We spent Friday at the show, walking until we couldn’t
walk any more, snapping pictures, sketching ideas for new packaging,
and picking out which trends we thought would stick in 2009 and beyond.
An exhausting day, but for anyone interested in design it’s the place
to be for one weekend every January!
In the time since the show, we’ve been no less active in our pursuit of inspiration. We’ve visited churches, cafes, galleries, chocolate shops (my favorite part), fashion showrooms, restaurants and spent plenty of time studying maps, all the while keeping track of the amazing things we’ve seen. Paris is, of course, a mecca for fashion and design, and we’ve been understanding this more and more with all that we’ve done here. Now our memory cards are full of pictures, our sketchbooks full of ideas, and our bellies full of chocolate, and it’s time to head back to San Francisco.
Over the next few weeks we’ll be sharing our observations and ideas with the larger team at method, and will begin to turn some of these ideas into reality. Unfortunately there’s no textbook that can tell us how to turn an experience like this into an award winning package, but that’s part of the challenge of being a designer. We’ll be incorporating bits and pieces of what we saw and learned into all that we do for the next few months. And although we probably won’t be releasing any Eifel Tower shaped bottles in the near future, you can be sure that the influence will still be there.
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