The Bow Tie Box
Perhaps the most unique and intriguing-shaped product ever created at Eldon, the Crayon Saver™ was born out of a basic consumer need.
Challenge – to create a compact, portable carrier for crayons that parents could keep with them wherever they went to use to entertain their children.
The solution would do that, as well as broaden Eldon’s school box product
line to include an even younger demographic, would also protect the crayons inside, and be an interesting, captivating design.
Design work began and a handful of designs were developed. A key component was size… small enough to fit in a purse, possibly even in a shirt or coat pocket. Once that was hit, now make it fun, active, energetic.
We now had a shape. Following our experience, the look was intensified, and thus made more appealing, by creating contrasting polished and textured areas.
I wanted it to have something more. Something truly unique. Something that made it interactive, that made it more than just a carrier, that gave it life… just in case you couldn’t find any paper.
If it’s a crayon holder, then let it “hold” the crayons. And so the top half was developed as a pressure fit holder, where crayons could literally be pressed into the lid where they were held in place, and with a polished “window” and a slight alteration to design, you could even read the writing on the crayon wrapper as it appeared to press up through the top of the box. This also provided a patentable utility feature.
Development
Even as just a CAD drawing, the look of the box was already grabbing attention as something really different and unique. SLA models of the product, while feeling very different than the finished product would, provide a functional prototype. Not too far removed from the final design, I mocked up an idea for a POP sheet that would be placed inside the product to help demonstrate use.
