Normalising Durex lube packaging & making it a seamless part of everyday sex.
Durex Lube
The Challenge
Durex Lube currently reinforces existing category stereotypes, which creates barriers to purchase. The challenge lies in resolving the tension between normalising the category and celebrating the product’s pleasure benefits. By drawing inspiration from the beauty and wellness sector, the brand can reframe the experience in a more aspirational and accessible way. Ultimately, the user journey should feel effortless, intuitive, and fully in harmony with the moment.
My Responsibilities
Brand Strategy
The project began with a deep dive into Durex’s lube portfolio, mapping it against competitors to identify emerging trends. We then carried out research to better understand Durex’s broad user base, which led to the development of four personas and detailed consumer journeys. We took this information and ran a workshop with all the project stakeholders.
Concept Ideation
We built on the insights from the discovery stage by rapidly sketching out initial concepts. From there, we moved into CAD prototyping to explore the forms in 3D and bring the ideas to life.
Rapid Prototyping
Throughout the development of this project, we created a lot of 3D-printed mock-ups of our ideas. This helped us clearly identify what was and wasn’t working. This was especially helpful when communicating the ideas with the client.
User Research
Before beginning user research, we narrowed our focus to three core concepts. We then collaborated with model makers to produce appearance models, shown above. To complement these, we also created animations to illustrate the functional aspects of the designs.
Exploration of CMF
After establishing and refining the form, we explored how colour, material, and finish could complement it, working alongside the graphics provided by Durex’s internal team. For this, we mainly experimented with label textures and applications, as well as the transparency, colour, and finish of the plastic caps.
Where I got to?
I left Path—and in turn, the project—shortly after the results of the second round of user research. I’m still incredibly proud of the project and the design process I went through, which led to these three solutions and am excited to see what the final result will be.