If you can’t already tell by our name, By Ninja are just a little bit obsessed with all things Japanese. This obsession encompasses our adoration of the art of Japanese paper folding: origami. In fact, we’ve been able to apply this delicate practice to create revolutionary designs that truly stand out from the crowd. We’ve even won awards for our skill in this area (our recent Gold National and State PICA Awards for the LUXE Unboxing Experience, plus several others). So let us tell you why we think you should consider consider incorporating origami into your designs:

Combining beauty with functionality 

Modern origami encompasses much more than just your traditional cranes and flowers. It’s more than simply “art” as it incorporates math, science and puzzles to add dimension and texture to otherwise ordinary designs. In fact, researchers and corporations are increasingly utilising origami in the fields of robotics, medicine, architecture, etc to solve design and space restriction problems. Being a qualified engineer, as well as our head kick-butt designer, using origami has allowed our Creative Overlord to combine her logical and creative minds to solve some seriously complex design dilemmas.

Essentially, this means that when we create our origami pieces, we’re not just focused on them being eye catching and memorable, we also want them to be functional. To ensure functionality, we take the time to carefully create each piece with full lifecycle in mind, meaning we thoroughly consider production, assembly, how it’s used by our client, how it’s received by the customer, and then, what the customer will do with it (i.e. recycle, reuse, etc).  During our creative process we sometimes use complex folds to replicate challenges (puzzle), and other times simple layered folds and thought out placements of text and brand elements. 

By doing this we’re able to create designs that operate as interactive storytelling platforms, allowing you to capture your customer’s attention while solving any space issue concerns.

Cost effective 

As well as being aesthetically appealing and functional, we’ve found that origami can also be cost effective. How? In most cases, we’re able to design these unique pieces for our customers that cost only a fraction more to produce than a standard solution, but deliver a much higher impact and return on investment. In fact, in some cases, the origami solutions we’ve generated, have cost our clients less to produce, because we considered each and every touch point and identified effective ways to create updatable elements that partner with permanent elements. 

One recent example of how we were able to use our specialist origami skills to create cost effective pieces was our design of the eco friendly menus for Goodness Gracious Cafe (GGC). Like many establishments, they refresh their menu every month or so, meaning prior to working with By Ninja they had to get their menus professionally printed and laminated each time (not very green). Keeping in mind GCC’s environmentally friendly yet high quality ethos, we came up with the solution of menu boards. While the initial upfront cost of the menu boards, recycled paper and eco bands was slightly higher, the lack of laminating and printing over the 12 months meant it cost less in the long term while having a greater visual impact, as well as it being much more environmentally friendly.  

 

 

By incorporating origami into our designs means we’re able to create designs that are both functional and engaging, while also potentially cost effective.