#23

Having designed a series of surface patterns inspired by each of the seven chakra points, a recent discussion with my peers made me realise that they really cannot exist as a piece of visual communication without having a strong context, particularly considering the sheer amount of research I had to date - which they considered was lost through the patterns standing alone. The first thought that came to my mind was to create a temple wall hanging or some other style of printed/embellished fabric. However, we still felt that this wouldn't bear enough context as it still wasn't representative or informative of the chakras or imbalance as a general idea. I let myself think about this over the space of a few days and inspired by the patterns frequently seen on tea boxes and also the health claims made, that I would create the packaging and online branding of a (fictional) tea company whose USP would be aiming to correct/cure any chakra imbalances and the impacts that these have on the physical and emotional health of the consumers. Further to this idea, each chakra point does claim to have associated flavourings and spices which genuinely help conquer these imbalances and I could use these to my advantage in creating a range of seven products.

Another reason which I think this is a sensible route to take my project is my lack of packaging experience. Silly as it sounds, it is something which I have not touched on since secondary school, yet something I desperately desperately wanted to improve on and gain practice in over the course of second year. Fortunately with an item such as teabags there is a lot of flexibility in shape and size of packaging as the individual items can be placed together in a variety of ways, or indeed I could opt to package loose leave teas. The website and other online platforms such as social media could be used to engage with customers and interact through the telling of stories, sharing of inspiration and possibly of yoga/meditation exercises to completely realign the chakra points.