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»We want to be part of a new generation of busi­nesses«

From the idyllic Cornish town Falmouth, Kingdom & Sparrow is revolutionizing the style of sustainable packaging. We visited the studio

Working at the Cornish seaside and in the former School of Art, where we ­talked to Kingdom & Sparrow founders Daniel Gradwell (top left) and Johnny Paton (top right) and to Client Director Sophie Cowles (middle right)

When you stand in front of the former School of Art in Falmouth, Cornwall, where Kingdom & Sparrow create their stunning packagings and corporate designs, and you get on your tiptoes, you can see the sea, the harbor – and the waves into which the de­sign­ers plunge now and then. The international success of the studio is not only due to talent and vision for sustainable packaging. The founders Daniel Gradwell and Johnny Paton are strongly convinced that it’s also the result of their lifestyle, which includes turning off the computers at 5:30 p.m. We talked to them and Client Director Sophie Cowles about work-life balance, the studio’s incredible craftsman­ship in style, the beauty of Cornwall – and the future of packaging.

Paint, print, draw: At Kingdom & Sparrow, people especially like to get hands-on. Also for their own School of Art branding

When I tried to contact you, the auto-reply stated that no mails are getting answered because you’re on a team day. So, what was that about? (laughs)
Sophie Cowles: We have a team day once a year where we all go out together. That is very important to us. This time our team day was connected to the pro bono work for a local mental health charity whose ethos comes from the healing power of the sea. They have a beautiful sailboat and we sailed with the crew around the coastline. It was amazing.
Daniel Gradwell: It was quite a contrast to sitting at our desks and it was very Cornish that it was raining (laughs). Besides pulling the ropes, we had mindfulness exercises and group meditations on deck.

I assumed the team day might have had something to do with you being a B Corp studio now – which means that you are certified for meeting not only the highest environmental standards, but also the highest social ones.
Daniel: We became a B Corp just a couple of months ago. The boat trip was part of things we’re doing any­way to look after each other and to address topics like well-being and mental health too.

How did you come to attain B Corp status?
Daniel: Aside from working with a lot of B Corps, we’re always pushing our clients towards sustain­able solutions. But we felt that we were never really looking at becoming a B Corp ourselves. So, we decided to do it. But it’s a long process and took well over a year to get everything together.

What is so intense about it?
Sophie: There are a lot of questions, and you have to provide evidence for every answer. We also had to rewrite our articles of association, had to look at our hiring policies, our wages and what we do about well-­being. Then there’s an interview process where they ask for even more information (laughs). It’s a lot of work, but very helpful too. And as we’re growing, it’s a good framework to do things right.
Daniel: We never had a breastfeeding policy before or special waste goals. We didn’t know how many tons go to landfill and how many are recycled. Now we have all these things in place.
Johnny Paton: Being a branding agency, packaging is a main part of what we do. And that changed so much. Ten years ago, when you were trying to be sus­tainable, it was really complicated. Glue was peeling off and it was hard to get biodegradable materials. It has only happened in the last few years that technology allows us to move forward, and packaging doesn’t have to be brown cardboard anymore to be recyclable. However, there’s a lot to learn, but it’s also interesting for us to see how we can push things in that direction, yet not at the expense of the planet. B Corp helped with that.

You call yourself a new generation of branding agency. Is this also connected to this ethos?
Daniel: That’s definitely part of it. B Corp is also a new way to do business. You can make profit and do good. We want to be part of a new generation of busi­nesses that are working to do well for themselves and their team, but also for their communities and the environment. But there’s a new consumer mindset as well. And that’s not necessarily about age, it’s about what people want to buy and from whom and how people want to interact with brands. So it’s not only about being a new generation, but about being there for a new generation too.

You work mainly for the food and beverage industry. How did that happen?
Johnny: That’s where Dan and I started. We had friends in the brewing industry who became our first clients. And then, ten years ago, there was a food rev­olution here in Cornwall. Suddenly lots of products were coming out of the county, and we were in the right place at the right time to work with a lot of those.
Daniel: And we really like it. Because when you’re do­ing products, there’s always that satisfaction to work on something that you can really look at. I always find it very rewarding to go down the supermarket and see our stuff and other people interact with it in their lives.

Little alcohol, a lot of draftsmanship: the hand of Small Beer‘s brewmaster became the trademark of the brand

I feel like there’s a new beer design every week – from landscapes to abstract art or animal portraits. Is this industry one that has taken the packaging design to new heights?
Johnny: Yes, brewers are releasing different beers ­almost on a weekly basis now. That gives designers an opportunity to showcase their skills. But it also changed how craft beer design works. You have a lot less time to be creative, but the brewers still want the design to be really innovative and conceptual. So now we often work more collaboratively with the brew­ing team itself to come up with ideas. Often there is a story or an experience they had whilst making this beer and that we can communicate on the packaging.

You published a white paper about what’s the next big thing for alcohol brands. So, what is it? (laughs)
Sophie: We wanted to share our views what brew­eries and distilleries should be doing next. For a long time, everything between breweries was about competition and they had been keeping very separate. Now that’s opening up a little bit and we thought about how they could work together as an industry, share ideas and communicate them better as brands. It’s all about sustainability, and we think there is a lot of potential in it. While huge brands are in a better financial position for new technologies and pioneer­ing new materials, start-ups have more innovative potential and persuasive power in return.

Drinking like a millennial: More and more non-alcoholic spirit brands are turning to the creatives for a sophisticated branding that is yet very contemporary Bild: Copyright Howard Oates

Another trend are non-alcohol spirits. How is your track record with them?
Johnny: We’ve done quite a few of them. We worked for Small Beer that has under two percent alcohol or for Juniperl and Wilfred’s. Important is that they still want that premium feeling in their branding. Even with something non-alcoholic it’s still about having something special.

How is that expressed in the design?
Daniel: Juniperl is a good example. It’s a zero percent gin and the packaging is very different from what you see on the shelves. It’s a photography col­lage in vibrant colors. It feels very young and like a special and enjoyable, tasty drink. We don’t want it to just be different, but to make sure that it still feels like what it is.
Johnny: People want non-alcoholic spirits still sitting within the alcoholic world. So often we’re look­ing there for design cues and twist and tweak them to give them a youthful energy and bring them up to date. For Juniperl we used a color palette that was based around pastoral pinks and blues that appeal to a Gen Z demographic who is more health-conscious and is drinking less. At the same time there are classic design cues on the bottle itself. The letter­ing is art deco inspired and takes you to that decadent cocktail world. But if you look at the illustrations you see a drag queen and a gay couple.

British aperitif in Italian style: For Sipello, the creatives designed a modern-but-timeless ­packaging with an illustrated bottleneck banderole on which an elegant party is in full swing

Craftsmanship is an important part of your work. Where does it stem from?
Johnny: I studied Fine Art and Illustration here at Falmouth University. When Dan and I set up, it was a skill I brought to the design side of things and ever since, it has paired very well with the food and drink world. We utilized those skills in our work from an early stage and got a bit of a reputation for it. Today we encourage the designers we hire to bring their own skills to the table. We think their personal skills are very valuable, we’re sharing and developing them and doing workshops like live drawing. But it’s not that we’re regularly drawing naked ladies (laughs). Most recently we had a workshop in traditional sign painting. Even those of us who are happier in the dig­ital world attended. We think it’s important to leave your comfort zone to awake new creativity and to inform your work in a different way. Most of the time the whole team is involved, and we like things like that.

You said before that packaging changed so enormously because there’re many more sustainable materials available and in a much better quality.
Daniel: They are the future. The options the pack­aging manufacturers offer are constantly growing. At the concept stage, when we’re coming up with design ideas, it’s much more common for us now to think about sustainability as well. You don’t have to put coffee in plastic to keep it fresh. Now you have compostable bags. You have bottle caps that don’t have plastic in them. As we have close relationships with manufacturers and producers of packaging, we can steer our clients in a sustainable direction through presenting them concepts that work with that.
Sophie: For some clients we also do a special research phase for materials. Recently we found an ink to print with that is created from the smog pol­lution in London.
Johnny: And a few years ago we had a chocolate bar design that is completely plastic free. It works with a card sleeve that can be closed without any use of tape. We’re thinking about sustainability from the very start. It’s often hard to do that when you are working with larger companies that already have their machinery. Being cutting-edge is more difficult for them. Convincing them to move forward is a central part of our work.
Daniel: But restrictions also led to interesting solutions. One of our actual clients developed the first fully recyclable cardboard packaging for a beauty range, and it’s interesting how those coatings and substrates can push creativity. It’s a fun way.

Upgrade your coffee: For Mission Coffee Works, a London roastery that wants to make great tasting coffee accessible for everyone, Kingdom & Sparrow created a split coffee bag design. One side is lifestyle-oriented, the other offers details about origin, processing, and more

So the material is an important starting point for designs for you.
Daniel: It can be. Different surfaces need different colors, different styles. Some just don’t work with incredibly intricate and detailed designs. And a very rough uncoated surface doesn’t hold color very well. We really had to learn throughout the years that pack­aging knowledge really does help make design much better (laughs). Some years ago, there was the first recyclable, biodegradable crisp packaging. We imme­diately used it, but it just didn’t work (laughs). Some­times that’s how it is with sustainability because you’re at the cutting edge of things.

And where do you see the future of ­sustainable packaging?
Daniel: Hopefully you just won’t know any differ­ence. We do also see reusable packaging a lot more. A lot of brands we’re working with at the moment are service based. You’re subscribing to something and getting refills. Things are developed just for you, just made when you need them, and the packaging is personalized and printed in-house. It’s a different way.
Sophie: And there are pros and cons. Because things being mass-produced can also mean that less energy is used or less waste is generated. But personalized products may really be used and there’s also less ­waste because only what is ordered is produced. Thinking about supermarkets, there will be more vegetables and fruits that will be grown there directly and sold in pots. There will be a lot of exciting things to man­age waste and single use plastics.

How does being in a small Cornish town influence your work? It is being said that there’s a thriving creative scene in Cornwall.
Johnny: Definitely. The university that has grown so much helps with that. A lot of creative talent has been educated in Falmouth. Before the pandemic they had to leave the county to find employment, but now there’s much more work in Cornwall. At the same time, more people don’t want to be in that London city rat race anymore and are looking for that certain kind of lifestyle here.
Daniel: We really approach work-life balance. People here finish work at half past five when we stop pay­ing them. Both with young families, we’ve always had a different perspective on that. But remote work is something that didn’t work for us all. We didn’t like doing it during lockdown. For a creative team, the power of being together in a room just makes your work a lot better. We all couldn’t wait to come back to the studio.

How do you think living by the sea influences your work?
Johnny: I think it’s really that work-life balance that Dan was talking about. In summer, it’s great to pop out at lunchtime, go into town or for a swim at the beach. I think it’s quite unusual for a design agency with global clients and big projects to finish at 5:30 p.m. and enjoy our evenings. And on the weekends, we relish the beauty of Cornwall. That’s quite energizing and inspirational. I mean we live and work at a vacation destination. What more do we need? (laughs)

This article was published in PAGE 09.2022. You can download the entire issue here.

PDF-Download: PAGE 9.2022

Demokratie gestalten ++ Werkschau-Brandings ++ ENGLISH SPECIAL Kingdom & Sparrow ++ Ukrainische Kreativszene ++ Typo für komplexe Daten ++ Webdesign: Flowers for Society ++ Social Design: Branding für WashKing ++ Offices für New Work

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