November 23, 2004

3:11 PM

Looking for examples of interesting non jewel case or digipack packaging ideas for CDs. If you've seen something special, please share.

Links to photos will be much appreciated.
posted by davebush to (19 comments total)

These guys:

http://www.5inch.com/

Do some cool work.


posted by idontlikewords at 3:15 PM on November 23, 2004

Good thread here.
posted by Danelope at 3:19 PM on November 23, 2004

A German company called Herzog Idex manufactures something called the SmartPac. It's basically 3 layers of heavy-duty cardboard pasted together to form a little "pocket" for the disc. No plastic is involved (except for the CD itself). Pretty neato.

They also apparently manufacture the SmartPac II and SmartPac Sleeve, but I don't actually own any CDs that are packaged in those...
posted by neckro23 at 3:23 PM on November 23, 2004

Friend of mine once bought a CD (can't remember the band) that had a wooden case. I shit you not. It was two squares of wood with a sleeve inside, and the two pieces of wood were held together by four strips of velcro in each corner. Weirdest case I ever saw.
posted by angry modem at 3:53 PM on November 23, 2004

Winter & Winter use SmartPacs. They're nice.
posted by kenko at 4:11 PM on November 23, 2004

depends how crazy you want to get, and how much work you want to do yourself. the sky's the limit. one of my label's future releases is going to be encased within a breezeblock, and another will come stuck inside an indonesian leaf scrapbook.

these guys do gel and liquid filled cd wallets.

bruce gilbert has just released a cd in a wooden box

dustball released an album in a shiny silver sphere.

how about one of these things? it's a silicon wafer shipping clamshell. just stick a little cd spider in the middle, and hey presto.
posted by nylon at 4:24 PM on November 23, 2004

AOL is evil, but sometimes they try quite hard to make their CD cases interesting enough so that you don't throw them away. I have one that is like a flat Altoid tin with full printing on the outside, and another that is the cutest little wooden box held closed by a magnet. (It worked, I still have both.)
posted by smackfu at 4:35 PM on November 23, 2004

I like Lucky Disc, but I wish they added more designs.
posted by riffola at 5:19 PM on November 23, 2004

A warning about the 5inch cases: they're addictive. I have one sitting on my desk, and I can spend hours popping the disc out and pushing it back in.
posted by DrJohnEvans at 6:33 PM on November 23, 2004

I just got a really awesome AOL CD case. It's made out of MDF (super finely compressed wood bits -- the stuff good speakers are made of) and coated with paper. It fits together super-tightly and looks awesome. Some pics I took: 1 2 3

It looks like these guys make them. I couldn't find a North American supplier.
posted by zsazsa at 6:41 PM on November 23, 2004

The guys at asaurus records always have great handmade packaging -- a floppy disc and an old Nintendo cartridge, for example.
posted by brad! at 6:52 PM on November 23, 2004

brad!, that floppy disk packaging reminds me of New Order's 12" single of Blue Monday.
posted by zsazsa at 8:41 PM on November 23, 2004

I've looked everywhere for a pic of the Spiritualized album/pillbox....
posted by glibhamdreck at 9:06 PM on November 23, 2004

Jewel Boxing.
posted by dobbs at 12:14 AM on November 24, 2004

I found C-Shells in college and became a big fan, but (a) the only similar products I've ever found in retail were Imation's bulkier clones that sold for $1 per and (b) they're obviously terrible for things like booklets and art. But for convenient, slip-in-your-pocket ways to protect individual CDs, I love them -- one piece, very slim, non-fragile. Another clone here.
posted by blueshammer at 6:58 AM on November 24, 2004

Although I can't find a picture online right now, Kirihito had this great puffy plastic folding case for one of their early cds. Too bad it was held together with velcro which came unglued and made it useless.
posted by aspo at 9:41 AM on November 24, 2004

There were some nice rubber cases on Super Furry Amimals Outspaced album

photo here
posted by James_in_London at 10:26 AM on November 24, 2004

There were some nice rubber cases on Super Furry Animals Outspaced album

photo here
posted by James_in_London at 10:26 AM on November 24, 2004

I seem to remember a story about some punk band in the 80s -- it might have been PIL -- packaging a single in film cannisters that had been welded shut. Basically, it was almost impossible to find a way to open the damn thing without ruining the vinyl inside. Anyway, that's probably not too helpful but what the hey it's an interesting story. It's certainly thinking outside the (jewel)box...
posted by Heminator at 2:33 PM on November 26, 2004