Mail a mini-garden to your loved ones
Reporter: Lotus Lau
Find conventional methods of communication too conventional? Fail to impress your friends and family with something more special than an email greeting for their birthdays or festive days? Try a Postcarden. Besides heart-warming messages, the recipient will get a mini-garden of his own.
Designed by London-based gift company Another Studio for Design, the Postcarden cleverly combines the functions of a gift and a greeting card.
Like an ordinary postcard, Postcarden has a picture and a blank space for users to write their message. But unlike a traditional postcard, Postcarden opens up to reveal a pop-up rectangular box. It comes packaged with a waterproof growing tray and a packet of cress seeds.
Simply open the Postcarden and release the mini landscape inside. Then, dampen the little backyard with water and put the cress seeds on top of it. Place it on a tabletop, windowsill or wherever sunshine is abundant, add some water and Postcarden will start to grow in a matter of days, lasting for two to three weeks.
You have probably been inundated with countless postcards from family and friends and have no idea of what to do with them. Greetings and blessings are definitely precious but there is not much you can do with them after you have read them.
With the Postcarden, you can have a mini garden and add freshness to your home or office. The ease of growing enables busy people in Hong Kong to have a taste of horticulture without spending too much time and it taking up too much space.
On top of that, from the cardboard display to the plastic growing tray, Postcarden is 100 per cent recyclable and the cress is fully edible. When the crop is mature, you can have a little harvest and make a nice salad with the cress, or you may even experiment with your own sandwich or soup recipes.
According to Another Studio for Design, Postcarden is “created to be more playful, curious and interactive. It encourages you to bond, live and grow the greeting on day-by-day basis. Over time the card reacts to you and your environment evolving in beauty and charm.” Whether you mail it or give it, the interactive part of it would allow your message to come across in an enchanting way.
Postcarden is currently available in Trends’ On in Hong Kong, and sells at HKD$98. It may sound a tad expensive for a postcard, but you will probably find it worthwhile when your greeting stands out from the crowd of greetings cards people receive for Christmas. For more information, please visit Postcarden’s website.
Photo courtesy of Another Studio for Design
