Balik is a graphic design project for the Ideation Models and Process course at the Savannah College of Art & Design. The concept was to take the cultural meanings behind the Balikbayan Box turn it into something new rather than merely improving on what already exists.

As a result, I created a singular gift for a singular person, my fiancée Rea. Included are photos with her and her closest friends along with watercolor paintings and handwritten quotes of memorable times. In addition, scanning the pages with an augmented reality app causes video messages to appear on the phone.

The “Balikbayan Box” is a term describing a box of goods that a Filipinos living abroad send to their home country. The term “Balik” means “a return” and “bayan” refers to one’s home. Therefore, in effect, the Balikbayan Box signifies a metaphorical returning to home in the form of gifts to loved ones left behind.

One common criticism of the Balikbayan Box is that it has gotten to be more impersonal. That the box of gifts doesn’t really reflect a close relationship nor does it help create one. Many overseas Filipinos often see the Balikbayan Box more as a chore or obligation. So if I were to just create an incrementally updated version of what already exists, then it would carry over these unfortunate associations. This is why for my project, I chose to make it extremely personal by designing it for my fiancée Rea. This way, any visual elements I included such as photos and quotes from friends and family spoke directly to her, making them more meaningful.

Although much of my professional history has been in digital design, this was an opportunity to create a predominantly physical design artifact especially since Rea is very much into handicrafts. So instead of using vector illustrations and digitally set type as I am accustomed to, I created watercolor paintings and handwritten text.

With these common visual elements, I still needed ways to differentiate the tone of each page. I had each page represent a different person in Rea’s life. Some of these relationships are quiet and intimate, some are rambunctious and chaotic. Therefore, I varied the hierarchy, scale, and layout on each page to reflect these differences.

Additionally, the box is in itself a picture book. This results in the box itself being part of the experience rather than being seen as throwaway packaging. Finally, the pages are joined together in an accordion fashion. This added to the overall meaning of connectedness to both people and home. The overall physical design also had the benefit of the being able to stand on its own like a photo stand while a person can still hold it like a regular book.

Photos, quotes, and related imagery are good to conjure up nostalgic memories of the past. However, if I wanted to give Rea a taste of home that she could carry around with her, I needed something more. Luckily, I stumbled upon the idea of implementing augmented reality in my project. Thinking about the various ways I could use the technology, I realized that it could serve up video and sound which would make the box feel more “alive.”

I requested personalized video messages from Rea’s friends and had those messages pop up from the pages using the augmented reality app Auresma. Each of the pages served as a visual “trigger” for the app, so as the phone scanned the page, an AR video pops up on the phone’s display. Just because much of this box was made with physical tools, doesn’t mean I couldn’t also use technology to enhance its meaning.

Rea is a big fan of puzzle and mystery games. Together, we’ve been to dozens of “escape the room” games. So I began thinking of a way to integrate this element into my project. After experimenting with augmented reality, I thought about the visual triggers and how to turn it into a puzzle with a payoff. My ultimate idea was to make the name tag on the box (a seemingly throwaway item) an important element in the interaction. On the last page was a picture of Rea herself with a conspicuous white circle in the photo.


Once she figures out that the name tag it perfectly in the circle, she could use the combined image as a trigger to bring up an AR button with the word “GO” in it. When pressed on the phone display, this button would take her to a micro-site that would allow her to record a message of her own and have it be sent to everyone who contributed to this project as a response. This also adds the benefit of preventing the box from being a one-sided communication artifact which would dampen the overall feeling of being “connected.”