FCTRY product design
Industrial and packaging design for a Brooklyn toy and cosmetics studio — from Unicorn Snot glitter to hand-sculpted action figures — ten products in a year, with overseas manufacturing and FDA/EU compliance.
Context
In 2016 I worked with FCTRY, a Brooklyn-based product design company whose goods are carried by retailers worldwide. As product designer, I helped develop new and existing lines — we shipped the Magic Bodega line of three new items and expanded existing lines to ten new products in a little over a year, from action figures to glittery sunscreen. I worked under the Chief Design Officer and Art Director across visual and industrial design, interfaced with our overseas factories, and attended expos in China to find new manufacturers.
Products designed
Unicorn Snot began as a single body-gel product in five colors and grew to include lip gloss, sunscreen, and lip glitter. I led the sunscreen development — researching factories to produce the formula and working with glitter and packaging suppliers — and built in-house packaging prototypes from blank tube samples and a CAD die-cutting machine, with holographic lettering. I was responsible for making sure the formula and packaging met FDA and EU regulations for our worldwide customers, and for overseeing product testing in accredited labs.
Unicorn Snot Lip Glitter, our most unique product, also went through in-person user testing that I ran with a range of participants — across the gender spectrum, from people who never wear makeup to professionals — to test applicators and application. We tested formulas against food and drink to make sure it could last a night out, then refined the applicators and primer into the complete kit, mixing our own glitter colors to match the original gel line.
Real Life Action Figures are each hand-sculpted by Mike Leavitt. I oversaw their manufacture — Pantone-matching colors, arranging 3D scanning and model refinement, testing prototypes, and designing packaging. What had been a once-a-year release became four figures in a single year, each funded on Kickstarter.
Magic Bodega was a set of standalone items: a holographic umbrella (which later joined the Hipsterkid line, plus an adult-sized run), custom-colored Rainbow and holographic Disco tape, and the Boxy shipping box for small shipments.
