I worked on creating this design with my design partner, Nancy Bauch in 1992 - and I still regard the project as one of my most successful design solutions and proud moments in my career. The original product line is still one of the best selling in the vast collection of tea-lines that The Republic of Tea has created.
In 1992, the original founders of Banana Republic and a few others decided to disrupt the tea industry in the United States by introducing truly fine teas to the American consumer market. Until that point, Celestial Seasonings was the only other brand that competed in that space - mostly with herbal infusions and not really "tea." Lipton and other "powders" were primarily what Americans regarded as Tea....and it wasn't popular.
The challenge was to craft a completely new experience and presentation of what the tea-experience was - and make it both intriguing and flavorful.
Being present at the formation of the company, I was involved in more than just the design. I mixed tea (some teas had additional flowers, herbs, and oils mixed in), I did demos/tastings (MACY'S, Williams Sonoma), and attended Tradeshows like the Fancy Food Show - to help promote and sell the teas. This broad experience really colored (positively) my early career - and seeing the importance of Brand in all design projects.
We pushed so many details in the early package design that are still present today. The top seal was an intricate leaf-collage that carried through the passion we had and wanted to share around "full leaf" teas.
Each unique label illustration was crafted individually using imagery that were found and hand-created to build a flavor feeling that conveyed the tea taste.
This was also a point in technology history when designers were just beginning to utilize layout software to do complete pre-press on the computer as well as color correction. This practice allowed us to create the full 21 label starting line in a short time.
