For mouthwatering, airy, flavorful macarons, Paris always comes to mind. But pastries from The City of Light actually exist right here in Los Angeles at Bottega Louie, a restaurant, gourmet market, patisserie, and café in the heart of downtown. We’ve spoken before with Erica Gibson about her work, and she has recently stepped into the role of Senior Art Director and introduced Art Director Mary Smudde to the team. For their seasonal macaron boxes Smudde incorporated the beautiful whimsy of poppies, and we spoke with her about inspiration and the design process.
The poppy packaging is seasonal. How did you work to create something that would fall in line with the Bottega brand but also shine on its own?
We really love surprising our guests with limited edition boxes so we try not to impose too many restrictions when designing them. We love bright, eye-catching designs that can stand on their own. BL had launched a line of single piece chocolates in the fall of 2015 that featured a bright, warm red and we wanted to continue that vibrant color in this new packaging. We had talked about the possibility of butterflies and flowers for this box because it felt seasonally appropriate and was a direction we hadn’t executed before.
