Dezeen Magazine

Yuta Takahashi designs minimal packaging for natural chocolate bars

Japanese designer Yuta Takahashi created the pared-back packaging for these natural chocolate bars to reflect their simple ingredients (+ slideshow).

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

Takashi designed the minimal wrappers and branding for Mandarin Natural Chocolate – a confectionary company which makes chocolate bars using only organic cacao and cane sugar.

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

Keen to represent the company's use of pure ingredients, Takashi's identity features lettering in a simple black-coloured serif font against a plain white background.

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

The wrappers are made from textured cardboard, with a layer of foil beneath to keep the chocolate fresh.

A line of 10 dots on the packaging subtly indicates the chocolate's intensity. Each one coloured black represents 10 per cent of cocoa in the mixture: so six black dots equals 60 per cent cocoa.

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

"Cacao has a brown colour, not altered by intentions or designs," Takashi told Dezeen. "Similarly, we wanted to express the rigour of this brand, our intention to pursue quality materials and exclusion of unnecessary ones by using pure colour."

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

"We felt that we wanted a typeface with pointed serif to express the sharpness we feel when we hold high-quality chocolate in our mouths," he added

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

The best before date and barcode are printed on the reverse along with a list of ingredients.

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

Takahashi's branding extends to a stationery range that includes business cards, envelopes and letterheads for the company, as well as simple trays for displaying samples of the products and carrier bags.

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

Other minimal packaging includes a log-like carton for birch-sap drink Tåpped, and a line of skincare products that feature grey and white crosses by Japanese studio Nendo.

Mandarin natural chocolate by Yuta Takahashi

Nendo has also completed a number of confectionary-related projects, including the interior of a chocolate shop in Tokyo, in which colourful chocolate bars are displayed in clear drawers and a set of chocolate pencils for patissier Tsujiguchi Hironobu.