The final solution utilizes flowers, icons of femininity. Specifically, Baby’s Breath and Poppies were selected for their cultural connotations. Western culture associates Baby’s Breath with love, purity, and innocence, while Poppies symbolize passion and strength. Collectively, the two blooms encapsulate the company’s target audience: the sweet free spirit and the adventurous wanderer.
Like Free People’s target market, the retail campaign has multiple layers. At first glance, the flowers appear to be photographic; however, on closer inspection, the flowers are revealed as water-color illustrations with tonal variation and depth. To add flourish, the poppy box’s inner flaps feature multiple floral layers, which gives the illusion that the flower blooms as the package opens.
Opening the package becomes an experience, and consumers are able to take some of Free People’s brand experience with them as they exit a retail store, or as they receive their parcels in the mail after shopping online. Additionally, the box and bag’s interiors are treated with colors that correlate to the packaging’s outer graphics (the orange poppy box has an orange interior; the blue and green bag has a green interior). To maintain consistency with the exterior graphics, the interior packaging also appears to be stained with watercolor, rather than mechanically printed. The accent color on the inside of the box and bag ensure that the consumer’s experience remains consistent from the first moment they receive a parcel, to the moment they open the package.
