The archive · Product Ideas · Product decision · 2023
Soapume Papier: paper-thin soap in a 100% recycled paper sleeve, no plastic case
Underline Graphic made the soap itself paper-thin, so a sturdy recycled-paper sleeve could replace the plastic case — Pentawards Gold.
Soapume Papier
What it had to solve
Soapume Papier, a portable paper soap whose name combines 'soap' and 'perfume', wanted packaging that took both halves seriously without the conventional plastic case such products usually travel in.
How it works
Soapume Papier is a portable soap made paper-thin, a product whose name joins 'soap' and 'perfume'. The design problem was the packaging: portable soaps normally travel in plastic cases, which undercut an environmentally minded product before it was even unwrapped.
Underline Graphic's idea was to remove the case by redesigning the thing inside it. Made paper-thin, the soap slips into a compact paper sleeve cut from a combination of thick papers, layered so the sleeve is strong enough to carry the soap. The sleeve itself is 100% recycled paper, and colour-coded versions distinguish the three scents — Relax, Refresh and Concentrate — for different moods.
The result is packaging whose material logic matches the product: a portable paper soap in a portable paper envelope, with a sliding unboxing ritual instead of a plastic shell. The design won Gold at the 2023 Pentawards and is preserved in D&AD's awards archive as a packaging example.
Why it lands
- Changing the product's form — making the soap paper-thin — removed the need for the plastic case instead of asking consumers to recycle it.
- Layering thick papers gave the sleeve structural strength through material choice, not through plastic.
- 100% recycled paper made the environmental claim true in the package itself rather than just in the copy.
- Colour-coded sleeves let three scents be told at a glance, turning the package into the brand's identity system.
What it did
The sleeve replaced the plastic case while keeping the unboxing ritual — the paper slides open rather than clicks shut. The packaging won Gold at the 2023 Pentawards and is preserved in D&AD's awards archive.
What you can take
To cut packaging waste, change the product as well as the wrapper: make the soap thin and the plastic case that existed to protect it stops being necessary.
Since then
Soapume Papier's paper-sleeve packaging won Gold at the 2023 Pentawards and entered D&AD's awards archive as a packaging example. Later Pentawards trend reporting cited the sliding recycled-paper sleeve as a model of imaginative paper use in beauty packaging — a small product whose packaging idea outlived the launch.
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