Trigger Fertilizer

Design: Valeriy Sleba
Location: Russia
Project Type: Student Project
School: HSE Art and Design School
Tutor: Leonid Slavin
Packaging Contents: Fertilizer
Packaging Substrate / Materials: Pulp Paper
Printing Process: Screen printing

This packaging project is called Trigger and it is a fertilizer for houseplants. I have chosen such strange name in order to demonstrate the metaphor: triggers, or impulses, as a psychological conсept commonly known to work only at humans or animals. So, paradoxically, here we have triggers for plants: fertilizers, which provoke plants’ growth, they “trigger” the plants’ growth.

The visual metaphor of this project is that humans’ heads are like pots for plants and the “sprouts” are our ideas, tempers, knowledge, fears. There is a famous idiom that fits perfectly — as you make your bed, so you must lie on it. The quite similar idea was used in the film “Inception” (2010) by Christopher Nolan. Therefore, there are different “sprouts” that grow from the head of three people, depicted in project. On the bag with Thom Yorke there you could see the temper growing from the pot; on the bag with Björk — beauty; on the bag with Jonny Greenwood — fears.

Also, this is a division between 3 different SKU’s, each of them is used for particular plant, the name and description of which is given on the yellow area. Moreover, there is a scale of intensity, so that the customer is aware.

Nevertheless, what are these insects and why are they there? Firstly, insects are plants’ close companions, especially pollinatin insects. Secondly, the whole project is a tribute to April Greiman, great designer of 80’s, which inspired me, so I decided to rethink her approach in modernity.

Technically, the project is just a paper bag with a window in it, so the customer may see the fertilizer. This makes the project eco-friendly and non-plastic.

What’s Unique?
Personally, I think that the uniqueness of this project is in the paranoid colours and insane composition. That is why, I intentionally planned the project to be in the anti-market sector, because clearly it is too strange for common customer (hope, this does not sound arrogant).