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Unwrapping Christmas with Benja

We worked with Benja, Paper Engineer from Paperform who dreamed up a creative way to help unwrap our fresh Christmas flavours this festive season. Benja and his team created some paper food, inspired by the key ingredients in our limited edition Christmas products with cut up paper roast pumpkin, cranberries, orange and, a beautifully cut and folded paper hibiscus flower just to name a few! Learn more about Benja and this unique art….

  • How did you become a ‘paper engineer’? How long have you been in the game for?

I studied graphic design at college and luckily had a rudimentary class in ‘paper construction’ which is where my passion for paper was ignited. I was excited by the idea of tangible paper objects being considered part of graphic design and set about creating a career in Paper Engineering. I founded my company, Paperform (www.paperform.com.au / @paperform) in 2004 as an outlet for my creative exploration of paper in all its forms.

  • What do you love about working with paper over any other medium?

Paper is such an endlessly inventive material – I love the flexibility it offers me a designer. It is a generally forgiving medium to work with and its folding and construction properties still inspire me all these years later. People always react with such joy and wonder when they see Paperform’s creations!

 

  • What has been your most challenging project you’ve worked on to date?

I recently created a pop-up book for baking superstar Katherine Sabbath. It was huge volume of her classic recipes with 10 pop-up spreads. That was a pretty intense deadline! Designing pop-ups really pushes my brain into new frontiers and I’m very proud of what the team and I all created together for Kat.

  • What inspires you?

I’m always finding inspiration in different places. I love to draw ideas from the urban environment that surrounds us. Travel is another way to get energised – I find I have so many new thoughts when I’m outside of my studio seeing the world.

 

  • How long did it take you to construct the pieces for us? Quick run over the steps you take to create

My team and I worked over two solid days to pull the assets together for the shoot. Taking the final design, we firstly choose the colours of the paper, making sure all the shades work together. Then we start mocking up in white paper to get all the elements working at the correct scale together. Once we have that, we slowly start to make each object and build the scene up as we go.

  • What does Christmas look like for you? Do you have any quirky Christmas traditions?

I will be spending Christmas with my family which I’m very much looking forward to it. The last few years I’ve bought a live tree for my house but left it undecorated. I like the simplicity of it.

 

  • Favourite Christmas food?

Christmas cake!! Look forward to it every year.

 

If you’re doing your Christmas shopping and looking to escape and refresh, be sure to stop by your local Jamaica Blue to grab yourself our limited edition Christmas Roast Chicken Wrap and the Jamaican Christmas Iced Tea! Available in stores until 31 December 2018. Find your nearest Jamaica Blue cafe here.