Abstract
In the growing emphasis on sustainability communication, brands increasingly rely on visual design to convey core values such as nature, transparency, and responsibility. Yet translating established sustainability strategy indicators into tangible, consistent visual languages remains a critical gap in design practice. Building on Li’s (2025) framework of five dimensions and seventeen strategy indicators, this study invited senior designers with extensive experience in sustainable personal care products to interpret and generate rich visual vocabularies. Using the KJ method, over 200 items were clustered into ten distinct design expressions—such as “trust and quality assurance,” “eco-friendly materials and packaging visibility,” and “emotional and cultural narratives”—providing a structured tool to transform abstract strategic semantics into actionable visual elements tailored to the personal care sector. This translation model was then applied to a representative Taiwanese sustainable personal care brand, systematically examining how its packaging, color schemes, typography, and material choices align with these identified categories. The analysis validates the practical feasibility of the proposed visual translation framework while also revealing a noticeable trend of stylistic convergence across sustainable personal care brands. This highlights a critical challenge and opportunity: future design practice must move beyond common aesthetic tropes to integrate authentic cultural narratives and differentiated visual identities. By doing so, brands in the personal care industry can more effectively communicate sustainability, deepen emotional connections, and strengthen market distinction.
Keywords
Sustainable; Personal care product brand; Visual translation; Design strategy; Packaging design
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2025.716
Citation
Li, Y.(2025) Visual Translation of Sustainable Brand Strategy: A Packaging Design Application, in Chang, C.-Y., and Hsu, Y. (eds.), IASDR 2025: Design Next, 02-05 December, Taiwan. https://doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2025.716
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Conference Track
Track 8 - Circular/Sustainable Design
Visual Translation of Sustainable Brand Strategy: A Packaging Design Application
In the growing emphasis on sustainability communication, brands increasingly rely on visual design to convey core values such as nature, transparency, and responsibility. Yet translating established sustainability strategy indicators into tangible, consistent visual languages remains a critical gap in design practice. Building on Li’s (2025) framework of five dimensions and seventeen strategy indicators, this study invited senior designers with extensive experience in sustainable personal care products to interpret and generate rich visual vocabularies. Using the KJ method, over 200 items were clustered into ten distinct design expressions—such as “trust and quality assurance,” “eco-friendly materials and packaging visibility,” and “emotional and cultural narratives”—providing a structured tool to transform abstract strategic semantics into actionable visual elements tailored to the personal care sector. This translation model was then applied to a representative Taiwanese sustainable personal care brand, systematically examining how its packaging, color schemes, typography, and material choices align with these identified categories. The analysis validates the practical feasibility of the proposed visual translation framework while also revealing a noticeable trend of stylistic convergence across sustainable personal care brands. This highlights a critical challenge and opportunity: future design practice must move beyond common aesthetic tropes to integrate authentic cultural narratives and differentiated visual identities. By doing so, brands in the personal care industry can more effectively communicate sustainability, deepen emotional connections, and strengthen market distinction.