With their latest limited-edition bottle, Absolut Vodka seeks to highlight the need to recycle and reuse our existing resources.
The Absolut Company, together with communication and design agency Drama Queen Communications, first briefed Ardagh Group’s Design Team to create a bottle design based on recycled glass, to promote and visualise the benefits of recycling. They collaborated to develop the ‘Absolut Comeback’ design: a bottle using actual pieces of broken, recycled glass, reflecting the recycled glass that goes into every Absolut Vodka bottle.
Ardagh’s designers used reverse engineering to create the ‘recycled’ bottle design. Product Designer, John Oczabruk explains: “Because this is a completely original bottle design, we first needed to create a sculpture by attaching pieces of recycled Absolut bottle glass to a 3D print of an Absolut bottle, to maintain the bottle’s iconic look and shape.
“The reverse engineering began by digitally scanning the sculpture into our modelling system, then reconstructing the design to work smoothly in Production.”
The detailed process required a pan-European approach: UK, Swedish and German design teams were all involved, using 3D prints, digital scanning and virtual sculpting techniques to create the final 3D shape.
The result looks to symbolise the bottle’s recycled content and aims to celebrate recycling and inspire others to recycle too, for more sustainable, circular living.
