COP2: Practical project: Barbie - Design development.

COP2.

PRACTICAL PROJECT / BARBIE.

DESIGN DEVELOPMENT. 

Today I began sketching up ideas of the back of the box, in terms of aesthetics, I was very much inspired by 1950's design. Since Barbie was released in the 1950's and this year marks the 55 anniversary since the first doll was released, I find this style very fitting. 

What inspired me most about this style was the fun and quirkiness, and also the vintage and retro appeal, communicated through random and interesting motifs and shapes. 

A vintage 1950's shoe advertisement:

I put some combinations of shapes together in reference to my work, as seen in my sketches. Each piece of technology within the box (Barbie's laptop, tablet and mobile) will have a sequence of these shapes as seen below. The pieces of information inside the boxes are a simple representation of how technology has forced us to think, the opposite of what Mcluhan has prescribed. This is shown through a quote, or two made by Barbie about a piece of technology, and an illustration of the piece of technology. 

Barbie is a large icon for many children, and children learn whilst in play. Here, growing children are being taught by Barbie, how to live in the realms of the modern world, in which internet, mobile phones and other devices are the new modes of communication. 

Below, they are taught that by possessing a laptop, they are able to do so many more things from the comfort of their own bedroom, than if they were to go out and complete a task, thus taking the social aspect away from the activity, such as shopping, and instead leading the child etc, to live a more integral life. This however not only applies to more materialistic commodities such as clothes and accessories etc, but also necessities such as food and drink which can be ordered online and delivered to your doorstep.

The same principles are communicated in the combination below. In which the information states 'I miss Ken, Lets video call him!' Previous to the internet, which is the only current way we are able to video call anyone, If you missed someone, you would have to go outside and pay them a visit. However with this new evolvement of the internet, we no longer even have to leave our bedrooms to see our loved ones, again echoing the idea of a more isolated lifestyle, which allows people to live solely within their homes. 

Now that mobile technology has graced us with the invention of the front camera on an array of mobile phones and tablets, we are able to take pictures of ourseleves more easily, leading to the worldwide phenomenon that arose in 2013, 'The Selfie'. From this we now see a population that is more obsessed about taking photos of themselves, and how they look, than capturing memories with friends or well enjoyed holidays etc. Again leading us to become more self involved. 

With most of the content decided I began working on the net. I themed the net with a link to the inside of the box by incorporating the pattern I had used for Barbie's wallpaper onto the back. I also made use of the 50th anniversary motif, (Barbie's head inside a circle) to make a link to the original branding. I also thought, that as this motif was a nod to the first release of Barbie in 1959, it has the vintage and retro aesthetic I was aiming to contrive for the rest of my box. 

Next I began putting all the technology combinations into place on the box.  I also came up with the idea to include a map on the back of the box which would specify how much of a global icon Barbie is, as I had learnt that she is sold in over 150 countries worldwide. the map would also imbue a sense of how much western culture is seemingly taking over the world. I parodied this idea by labelling the map, not with a list of which countries sell the doll, as this would be much too long to put on the back of a box, but instead,  communicating the idea that although we are supposed to be living in a smaller world, many people of the west, would not be able to point out an eastern country on a map if asked. Whereas, If it were to be the other way around, people are easily able to point out western countries as they are so dominant within the world. 

I also slightly changed the aesthetic of the combinations to make them easier to read for the user. Creating a colour sequence, that allows the user to understand which boxes are associated with each other. 

I added the labels to the top of the box to indicate that the Barbie was supposed to be a 55th anniversary Barbie, in which I labelled 2014 Barbie to reiterate the idea that what is seen on the back of the box, and what this Barbie is branded is is reflective of culture in 2014, and therefore the 21st century. Giving  a visual representation of how Mcluhans global village thesis, has actually materialised. 

I also added a couple of other details, in which I took two components seen on a regular Barbie box and manipulated them. These components further pursue ideas that there is not much real empathy or knowledge of what goes on outside the western world. The dolls in which we purchase, not only Barbie, but many other brands are made via cheap labour across the east and through Asia. I have also noted in the second motif that the purchase of the doll, especially in eastern countries, will lead to a weakening of culture, and a stronger stance of the western way on eastern soil. Much like the growth Of Mcdonaldization I speak of in my essay with reference to Ritzer.  

Next I designed the objects which I would be placing into the box with barbie. These include; The tablet, the laptop and the mobile phone. I decided to make these alike to the toys I recieved with dolls when I was younger. Creating a shape out of wood or plastic, than aplying stickers to the surface of these to make them appear like a certain object. Below are the stickers I designed for the objects. 

Here we can see Barbie video calling ken on her tablet. 

shopping online on her laptop for clothes. 

and taking selfies on her mobile phone. 

When applying these items to the design on the back of the box, I changed the shapes in order for them to comply with the rest of the design and fit in with the 50's theme. 

The last section I added to the box was in light of Barbie's 'extra accessories' which consisted of Barbie's standardised house which could also be purchased from the range. The idea of Barbie's standardised house further mimics the idea of a standardisation in reference to the way of living and also to Mcdonaldization. Architecture is a clear image of how design is becoming more standardised. Here I Parody the idea that housing design is becoming standardised, Housing designs are created, and can be cut and paste into any location making them more space and cost effective, and therefore accessible to a larger range of people from different class backgrounds etc, Distributing this via a Barbie which is sold to many different countries promotes the travel of this Western way of design even further.

The illustration is again inspired by the 50's theme, a running aesthetic on the box and also caricatures the image of a standardised house. 

Below is the overall design for the back of the box net. 

To further improve the aesthetics of the design, and adapt them more so to the other anniversary boxes produced by Barbie, I wanted to foil the 55th anniversary emblems seen on both the front and the back of the box. However when I went up to the foiling facilities at uni, I was not able to get a screen as they were all taken, and with the bank holiday looming, I will not have time to foil the box the day before hand in, for fear that this could go wrong and I wouldn't have the time to fix it. 

However not foiling the design does not compromise my final piece, as what Is very much important within this piece is the function rather than the form. 

COP2 Practical project / Barbie: Initial designs.

COP 2. 

PRACTICAL PROJECT / BARBIE. 

INITIAL DESIGNS.

As I had noticed that lots of the other boxes Barbie had been in mimicked the idea of the box being a room that Barbie is in. Therefore I thought about where Barbie could be in context, within the box I am designing. The whole idea of the doll is to portray a more integral life, and so the idea came to me that more children, with the change of culture, are spending more time alone in their own rooms on laptops/tablets etc, then they do in any other part of the house or outside. Even boys do this, playing with their friends on online games on xbox and playstation etc rather than actually socialising with them. For this reason I have chosen to theme the inside of the box as Barbie's bedroom. 

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Using the above room designs for inspiration, I began sketching out the inside of the box which will double as Barbies bedroom, I wanted to do a very feminine and plush design with quite a lot of curved and cushioned furniture. I also wanted to create a design in which the items I will be placing inside the box could sit appropriately and in context. Therefore I cleverly positioned a shelf and desk into the design, the shelf would hold the tablet, whilst the desk would hold the laptop and the mobile phone would be attached to the doll. 

With an idea in mind I created a quick model in sketch up using furniture from the google 3d warehouse to gain an accurate perspective of the design, to ensure I was drawing each object from the right angle. These are not the objects I will be using in my design, however they give me an accurate view and set of shapes to work with 

I then created a digital version of the net I had previously sketched up, to scale In exact size to ensure, even through I was creating a vector image it was the correct size. I did this but inputting all the values I described in my box dimensions post.

Next I combined the perspective model on sketch up with the net. Here I could plan out an position the objects on the packaging so that there was enough room on the desk for the laptop, the tablet on the shelf and the mini book underneath the desk. I began creating the design on illustrator by combining a number of elements. My colour choices stemmed from the photos of Barbie bedrooms seen above, the style, from the sketch I had previously drawn of the room and the perspective model in order to do the illustrations from the right angles.

I began tracing over the model implementing the style I had prescribed (much more feminine and girly than the furniture in the model). Step by step I built up the illustration adding layers, and working through a colour pallet of many different pinks.

Below is the inside of the box almost finished, I do think that the design looks quite hectic, however it is clear from my research that Barbie is very over the top. I found it quite difficult to work with a pallet of solely pinks and white, as it was difficult to not have parts of the design blending into one another but I believe I succeded in the end. 

I also added further touches to the design such as the carrier bag in the bottom right hand corner which reads 'Barbie online shop' The aim of this packaging, is to show how integral we have become as a globe instead of more embraceable. I reference the line 'Theres no need to go outside, we can shop online!' this is a further application of this part of the concept. Below I also changed up some more of the colours to ensure further that they do not blend into one another.  

Next I will move onto designing the mobile, tablet and laptop that will come inside of the box as Barbie's accessories. using my scale illustration / design above I placed where abouts I would like these items to be attached to the box. 

I already knew the size which I wanted the book to be and so this is inputted into the bottom of the design. However by also placing the tablet and Laptop into the design I was able to gage the size they would need to be, I also checked the sizes of these against the Barbie doll to make sure that they wouldn't be out of proportion. 

Tablet:

width: 30mm

height: 40mm

Laptop screen:

width: 50mm

height: 35mm

Laptop keyboard:

width: 50mm

height: 30mm

COP2 Practical brief: Box dimensions.

COP2.
Practical Brief.
Barbie: Initial sketches and designs. 

To Begin with I wanted to try and put a simple scale next together so that I would know, approximately, the size of the box I would need to be designing for. In order to do this I took the Barbie I bought and measured the size of the box. Although width wise my box would be wider as It is going to come with more accessories, the height and depth of the box would be the same. 

The measurements for the height and depth of the box which I will be using are:

Height - 320mm.

Depth - 60mm.

The width of this size box containing only the doll by itself is 115 mm. As I will be putting accessories into my box aswell as a time line book I think that it is important that I increase the size of the box by at least 50%. Making the width of the box 175mm.

I tested the width of the box by drawing up a simple diagram in illustrator. In the diagram I have plugged in the measurement for the width of Barbie and how much of the box she would take up which is 85mm. I then have a 90mm width left over which may seem like a large amount of space, as it is wider than that allocated for the actual doll, however I have to put the small leaflet/booklet of 55 years of barbie in this space, of which 90mm appeared like the appropriate size. 

I decided that in terms of design, my 55 years of Barbie packaging would follow the same kind of shape as others gone by, creating a cardboard shell for the bottom back and sides, whilst creating a large window to the front, for easy viewing of the doll out of acetate. 

Therefore I next started to sketch up the shape I wanted the Barbie packaging to take on, similar to the ones above.  I sketched up two ideas, However I preffered the second due to its more modern and cleaner appearence. At first I wanted to do the corner triangles because I didn't want the top strip to block the view of the window to much, however I found I could still do this in a strip format by making the second very slim The parts not coloured in represent the acetate window. 

Next, so that I am able to get on with designing the bock efficiently I sketched up the shape of the net, and then drew it bigger with measurements. This will be easy to reproduce with measurements. 

I then, with help of the diagram I had previously drawn up in illustrator that referred to the inner space, drew up the size and format of the small booklet which would be placed inside. The booklet would be a corsertina format. As the content of this will be in a timeline, the user can open up the booklet fully in order to view the whole timeline. I created a size for the booklet that fit into the section I had put aside for accessories in the box, leaving some room round the edge for any glitches. 

COP2 Practical brief : Barbie research.

COP2.
PRACTICAL BRIEF.
BARBIE RESEARCH.

PACKAGING.

Today I went down to my local tesco which sells children toys and found a number of Barbie's in store. I wanted to try and get a feel of the visual which barbie produces through the packaging.
I took pictures of a lot of the different models I saw.

Here the Barbie box has quite a lot of information on the back concerning the products inside, such as what there is, warnings, what the Barbie does and other pieces of information. The main piece of information (seen inside the box with heart) reads Barbie and friends, however the information is written in 8 different languages. The Barbie website can be seen linked on the back of the box this can be read in 12 different languages. I think that in order to make my packaging appropriate and be able to fit everything I want on the back of the box, it should be mostly visual based so that I wouldn't have to worry about listing languages. However their will be a reference to where abouts the toy is sold through a map. 

I noticed that some of the boxes were very well themed, the box below for the 'style barbie' has been designed to look like the doll is on front of the magazine cover. This fits well with the function of the barbie, inside is a 10 page fashion book. 

The Potty training Blissa Barbie, is also a box which is themed. Instead of just sitting inside a box, The barbie is inside her house, making the box almost seem like part of her home, the place in which she potty trains Blissa. By creating the box design so it looks like a location which Barbie is present in, the doll is given more purpose. 

Although there were earlier boxes, such as the first I saw which seem to have a lot of information on the back such as warnings and doll features in lots of different languages. This box has a very simple back, in which only pictures are used to describe the products inside the box. This is much simpler for a child of the age who plays with Barbie's to understand. I think for my project as it won't be a purchasable toy for children, I do not have to include information such as warnings, etc but instead focus on the purpose of Barbie, what she does, and why she is doing this.   

I found another Barbie which has adhered to the changes in culture, Here Barbie is seen with a set of coloured pattern strips which children are able to put onto Barbie's hair and change the colour and look. They do this by treating the strips like transfer tattoos, wetting them clipping them against the hair and then pressing them together with a straightener like tool. This could lead to young children wanting to change the colour or appearance of their hair at a young age, by using these tools on Barbie's hair, such as the piece with the straightener aesthetic, they may want to do it to there own. Children are becoming younger and younger by the time they begin using appliances such as these, and the product below is helping to accelerate this process. 

Again the back of the box shows images of what Barbie looks like when following the instructions. There is also a large amount of information on the back of this box in terms of product information and warnings. However this is probably due to the purpose of the toy and the items which are inside the box. 

I also noticed that the sides of the box are very well tended to and not left plain, These are used to further distinguish and promote the very large brand. 

55 YEARS OF BARBIE:

I had stated that I wanted to put a booklet inside that celebrated the '55 years of Barbie' and pick one Barbie for the timeline from approximately every decade until now since the Barbie was first realeased in 1959.

First Barbie 1959:

The first Barbie was released in 1959 by Ruth Handler, whom wanted to create a doll with a grown woman's aesthetic for her daughter whom at the time only had dolls who were babies. The birth of The Barbie brand was at this very time, where in the commercial the words 'Someday I’m gonna be, exactly like you. Till then I know just what I’ll do. Barbie, beautiful Barbie, I’ll make believe that I am you.' were sung, making it appear that unless one looked like Barbie, one wasn't beautiful. 

Barbie 1964 Swirl Ponytail:

The newer 1964 Barbie now featured a more tanned complexion and lighter, straighter blonde hair. 

Barbie 1968 Christie:

In 1968 Barbie released the first coloured Barbie which was named 'Christie'. However she still had the exact same facial features as the caucasian Barbie, meaning that it was not an accurate depiction of what a coloured Barbie should look like. 

Barbie 1992 Teen talk Barbie:

In 1992 Teen talk Barbie was released whom spoke a number of different phrases such as 'Wanna have a pizza party?', 'I love shopping' and 'Will I ever have enough clothes?' There were 270 phrases put together for the Barbie and a few were selected for each doll, meaning that the dolls appeared very much individual. One of the phrases spoken was 'Math is hard'. Many people complained about this including the American association of University women, and so the dolls production was stopped and anyone with this Barbie was offered a swap for another.  

Barbie 1997 Oreo Barbie:

In 1997 Oreo Barbie was released, Oreo Barbie was supposed to be a doll which girls could play with after school whilst enjoying 'America's favourite cookie', the Oreo. However what Mattel did not consider was that the term Oreo is a derogatory term for a woman who is Black on the outside and white on the inside, because of this the doll was very much unsuccessful.

Barbie 2009 Totally tattoos Barbie:

Totally Stylin' Tattoos Barbie was released in 2009, Girls could not only apply a range of tattoos to their dolls, but due to the items which came with the Barbie, were able to put them on themselves as well. However the Chief executive of customer focus argued against the production of the doll remarking that Girls may want to get tattoos themselves.

Ending with Barbie 2014.

Barbie 2014 released for the 55th anniversary of Barbie, does everything a modern day girl would do with the ability to use her new possessions such as her Mobile phone, tablet and laptop with wifi. She Texts her friends, Takes selfies, video calls her boyfriend Ken and orders clothes online. She also has other accessories such as her standardised house, which can be folded down into a box, and taken with her wherever she travels! 

CELEBRATION AND ANNIVERSARY BARBIES:

I noticed that looking at most of the anniversary Barbies, the boxes are quite plain and are basically used to house the Barbie and nothing else. That was until the release of the 50th anniversary Barbie released 5 years ago in which is a nod to the very first Barbie released in 1959. The box takes on a very vintage and retro aesthetic, and also includes newly designed fashion items for the old doll. 

However one thing that I noticed was occurrent throughout all the box designs was the use of metallic foil across all boxes as they were a special celebration. This is something I should consider for my box and the celebration of 55 years.