Packaging awards to showcase fresh design talent

The Packaging Impact Design Award (PIDA) event sponsored by Swedish paper manufacturer Korsnas, in its seventh year, is being held on 7th June 2011 at the Hotel Marriot, Champs-Elysées, Pari, with the hope of unearthing the latest innovative designs.

Running since 1994, the event consists of a seminar as well as the award ceremony, with the aim of showcasing innovative packaging designs from students in Spain, France, Germany and Sweden, with the best project winning according to form, function, consumer appeal and innovativeness.

PIDA is one of the ways we connect with tomorrow’s design professionals. It’s an event we stage where we connect with tomorrow’s design professionals. It’s an event we stage where they get an introduction to the industry. And it’s our way of contributing to the dynamic development of packaging design”, explains Agneta Rognli, Business Communication Manager at Kornsnas.

With a different theme and brief each year, this year’s theme is based on the idea of packaging in a self-service industry being on its own in selling the product, dispersing consumer information and building trust.

As such, headlined The Silent Saleman, the challenge is to come up with a fictitious brand in a given premium segment and to create a packaging concept that is eye-catching, functional, protective and tamper-proof.

The event will see invited keynote speakers give speeches including their outlooks and insights; moreover, converters, designers and brand owners mingle with students, trade press members and korsnas’ own experts in papermaking, product development and forestry.

Previous winners

Last year’s theme was to give old packaging a new lease on life; to identify an alternative purpose beyond its original role. The winner, “Hands Up,” was a package in the shape of a hand for a football club t-shirt.

Based around the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, the t-shirt was designed for supporters of the French team. The winners, Esepac’s Alexandre Fleuret and Cécile Braconnier, were awarded a trip to Stockholm and a visit to the Korsnas mill in Frovi.