Cathay Destination Tote Bag
Project Team
Product Theme
Tote bag packaging project
Date
April 2022 - October 2022
Dennis Lui - Industrial Designer
About
Take a little piece of the world with you wherever you go with our colorful, postcard-inspired destination tote bags. They’re the perfect way to show your favorite travel locations to your everyday life. Featuring retro-inspired illustrations of iconic landmarks or scenes from one of seven cities Cathay available cities: Tokyo, Beijing, Los Angeles, Amsterdam, Taipei, Shanghai and Hong Kong.
This was the first project since joining the company introduced me to the world of packaging design and graphic design.
Project Brief
I was tasked with refining a tote bag design, focusing on enhancing the user experience through improvements in material selection and feature integration. Additionally, I was assigned the responsibility of designing the packaging for the tote bag, with the added goal of ensuring the packaging serves a secondary purpose.
Inspiration
Cathay Destination
The illustrations by Evelin Toledano are the main showcase of the tote bag packaging. They enhance the bag's design with layered 3D elements, adding dynamism while maintaining the initial simplicity that celebrates the year of travel.
Postcard Inspiration
Postcards offer a snapshot of time, providing insight into life at a particular location. Whether sharing special moments or simply keeping loved ones in mind, postcard designs serve as reminders of connection and thoughtfulness.
Poster Like Aesthetic
The illustration simplicity beautifully capture the destination beauty, similar to a poster. To capture the spirit of that destination, the packaging have to follow suit to ensure the packaging and the tote bag convey the same feeling.
Design Iteration
During the design iteration, I explored the use of materials like Kraft paper for a greener approach, aiming to encapsulate the essence of travel and the primary destination depicted in the illustration. Ultimately, we aimed to utilize the illustration as the primary design element, highlighting both the beauty of the graphics and the destination they represent.
The Process
The tote bag initially started off as an basic canvas bag. The material was thin and did not have any convenient feature. I purpose to change the bag to a thicker material, phone pocket fitting at least an iPhone Pro Max. As this is my first ever experience in packaging design, there were a lot of trail an error understanding layout and placement from mock up iterations.
Final Packaging Design
Take a little piece of the world with you wherever you go with our colourful, postcard-inspired destination tote bags. They’re the perfect way to bring a little travel magic to your everyday.
