Description:

Art & Creativity + Youth + Mental Health = With Wonder

Art therapy boxes that promote mental wellbeing through a self-directed therapeutic experience, and are grounded in the real-world practice of art therapists and psychotherapists.

Our client Breathing Space, a registered NZ charity, came to us with an early-stage concept. Founded in Tāmaki Makaurau in 2016, Breathing Space provides free, trauma-informed therapy and group programs to young people, with a focus on those facing systemic barriers to wellbeing.

Alongside the founder, Asha Munn — the only registered art psychotherapist in Aotearoa, EMDR therapist, and a graduate of Elam School of Fine Arts — this project was born as a result of lockdown. When the Breathing Space team could no longer meet the growing demand for services, they adapted by preparing makeshift care packages with art materials — the ‘art box’ quickly became a vehicle for offering support to youth in times of need.

We helped bring With Wonder to life as a product system; using art as a medium for improved mental wellness.

With Wonder is the belief that art and creativity can have a transformative effect on the mental health of at-risk youth in Aotearoa.

Each With Wonder box is designed in collaboration with a different NZ artist — with the likes of Lissy and Rudi, Jade Townsend, and Te Ara Minhinnik featured in the first releases.

The With Wonder packaging was designed as a robust system that will allow non-for-profit Breathing Space to collaborate with an array of Aotearoa’s artists.

We developed a bespoke dieline which can house interchangeable content, featuring a pocket on the front to display each artist’s work, and a customisable, affordable-to-print label system that communicates each Volume No. and authoring Artist, without the need for individual printing on the boxes themselves.

Upon opening the box, the user is invited to ‘Start Here’, pulling out the Welcome Guide from an interactive pocket set inside the box. Simple prompts like this throughout the experience offer gentle guidance for the user in how to use the box.

The experience is designed to feel special — materials are enclosed in a custom-printed tissue paper, sealed with a sticker for each user to unpack.

The structure of the box itself and how it holds its contents has been designed to feel loose and effortless. After originally exploring modular compartments for items in the box, we opted for a canvas bag to be contained inside; a less prescriptive approach to putting materials away, keeping it easy no matter what kind of day the user is having.

We dream of a world where healthcare practitioners and medical professionals prescribe art and creativity, in different forms, to care for our mental health; a world where self expression and healing through art & creativity can happen everyday, across Aotearoa.