It’s the collaboration you didn’t know you needed: Ye, Fukasawa, and the Golden Arches themselves. Yesterday (May 24), Kanye West announced on his personal Instagram a collaboration with “industrial designer Naoto Fukasawa to reinvent McDonald’s packaging”. The post featured a glimpse of a reworked box – we’re guessing Big Mac – in 8-bit, industrial fashion, brandishing the burger ingredients and the McDonald’s logo. The post was accompanied by an Instagram story referring to Gold digger: “Next week it’s fries”. Keeping things incredibly short and sweet, as is often the case with West launches, the internet was left, largely loving it, but with many questions. So here’s the context.
Ye has a long history with design. In fact, in a 2007 interview with Complex, he went so far as to say, “I always say I was a designer before I was a rapper.” While his evolution in the world of fashion – from an internship at GAP in 2009 to his current global projects with Yeezy – is well known, this is not the first time that West has championed initiatives in the fields of design. . In 2018, West announced the introduction of Yeezy Home, an architectural and product design arm of his fashion empire, beginning work on social housing projects inspired by the Star Wars igloo. From Yeezy shoes to Luke Skywalker-inspired cases, shapes that connect the world between functionality and sculptural futuristic visions have always been West’s signature.
This design approach lends itself well to the legacy of Naoto Fukasawa, a designer who has been at the forefront of the world of product design for decades. Best known for his work with Japanese homewares retailer Muji, Fukasawa is the designer behind several singular pieces in graphic design history. Examples include his iconic wall-mounted CD player for Muji in 1999 and his famous INFOBAR mobile phone from 2003, which featured a long, thin, brightly colored shape. Both were highly unusual for the time and remain so. Having also designed for Herman Miller, Alessi, B&B Italia, Magis and HAY, Naoto Fukasawa is renowned for his modern, minimalist and contoured forms that seamlessly integrate and respond to people’s daily lives. Naoto Fukasawa also believes in blurring the line between a product – be it a kitchen fan or a chair – and other familiar objects, which makes sense given his latest riff. on form with West.
Ye McDonald’s relationship is more surprising, but still pre-existing. A figure in constant collaboration with major brands, from Gap to Adidas, he featured in Mcdonald’s Instagram promotional stories in 2020 revealing his favorite dish – milkshake, side of fries, Chicken McNuggets and spicy barbecue sauce, for those who are ask.
While it has yet to be revealed if the new Fukasawa, Fifth element-the worthy packaging is an official collaboration with McDonald’s, we hope the next preview of the potential range will be a reimagined Happy Meal box.