While packaging technologies are in a constant state of flux, the extend and rate of flux are often modest, and this has been the case over the last decade or so of clamshells and multi-layer cartons. But occasionally there are jolts to the system, and the pace of change accelerates beyond what many thought possible. And this is certainly the case here.
Such refocusing does not aim to exclude profitability as a motivating factor. A neglect to consider financial incentives is no different from neglecting to consider environmental impacts – both fail to address the larger picture. Instead, there is a need to embrace the complexities of the larger system, and incorporate the industry’s ‘triple bottom line’, which accounts for the social, the environmental and the economic considerations of operating a business.
As a model for successful integration of sustainable ideas, numerous examples of the work done by these visionaries comprise the later part of the section. Many of them are realized with cartonboard. Two case studies.

Case Study: Twist
Maintaining a clean kitchen shouldn’t require polluting the rest of the world, yet with the present over-reliance on single-use paper towels and toxin-laden sponges, this has too often been the case. The sponge company Twist began with making products derived from fully sustainable resources, and completed the cycle by wrapping their products in equally sustainable packaging.
Founders Brian Ross and Egil Wigart intent on combining good design with environmenal responsibility as a means of creating “functional, beautiful and responisble alternatives” to standard kitchen cleaning products.

Case Study: Celery Design Collaborative
With the motto of “Smart, Fresh and Healthy“, Celery has worked with large corporations such as HP and Sun as well as small companies. Their latest packaging project is an innovative secondary-use package for Lemnis Lightning, a Dutch company that has helped revolutionize the lighting industry.
The package has been specified with cartonboard and designed for assembly without adhesives. The carton can be converted into a lampshade in a few steps. A colour-coding system to clearly designate different bulb wattages becomes a major design element in its own right, covering the entire top an dbottom of the package, and coating the interior of the carton so that, when converted into a lampshade, the colours provide a vibrant and modern aeshtetic.

Scott Boylston, Designing Sustainable Packaging, Laurence King Publishing, London 2009