Tomorrow Machine – Thinkiblity Nibble

A self-opening bowl! Flexible objects that can build and even destroy themselves! Tomorrows food packaging has arrived.

Food packaging is serious business and Sweden have a history filled with successful designs and companies, like Tetrapack and Ecolean  (sustainable packaging). Tomorrow Machine is an exciting innovative company based in  Stockholm and Paris, which specialises in package, product and food concepts. The vision is to build a better world through research, new technology and intelligent material. Science is used a base for creating and shaping the best innovations of tomorrow.

Sweden has lots of forest and traditionally material from the forest has been used in designs. But how will material be used in the future?

A taste of the future can be seen in a series of cellulose based products. A self-cleaning  plate and cup made ​​entirely out of cellulose is based upon using  biomimicry to design innovations. Like a lotus leaf the plate and cup rejects dirt. The superhydrofobic coating  means that it never needs washing.Thus, the plate and cup are kept clean without using any water, chemicals or human efforts. Lotus leafs water-repellent characteristics have also been used to design water-resistant clothes

Questioning the way everyday products are used, is part of an innovative process. Today, it takes several years for a milk cartoon to decompose naturally. The milk in the cartoon goes sour after a week. Tomorrow Machine is working on a packaging product  that has the same life-span as the foods that it contains. The underlying idea is to search for  ways that the packaging and the foods can work in symbiosis just like the sea anemone and the hermit crab. The sea anemone rids on the crabs back and extends their tentacles to eat the crabs leftovers. The crab benefits from the sea anemone, which drives away octopuses and other predators by using their barbed tentacles.

Costs for transportation is another area where innovative thinking is needed. Tomorrow Machine has created a self-expanding instant food packaging. This product can be compressed during transportation. Pour hot water into the package and suddenly you have a bowl with food.

I never realised that food packaging could be this exciting. An environmentally friendly approach mixed with smart and creative solutions like the self-opening package that opens when the food is cooked.  The company Tomorrow Machine elegantly proves that determination to improve things can lead to great innovations.