Inspiration: A Tea Bag Package Folds Into An Origami Cup

Someday, when I learn how to make my own infographics, I’m going to design one about the difference between tea drinkers and coffee drinkers. I hope it will be as insightful and funny as this one about cat people and dog people. Since I work with Richard all day, maybe I notice it more than most people. He is constantly drinking hot tea, and I can’t imagine going one day without coffee. He even wrote an article comparing the health benefits of coffee vs. tea.

However, based on the designs I’ve written about over the past few years, it goes deeper than that. I get the feeling that tea drinkers are more sophisticated, more elite and more creative. It’s like the tea drinkers are riding in the back of the limo, and the coffee drinkers are driving it. Maybe that’s just a skewed impression that I have, but have you ever seen the complexity and artistic inspiration that some people get from tea bags?

For example, if you look at this tea bag design, this tea bag folded into an origami bird, and this tea bag art, you’ll start to understand what I’m talking about. Have you ever seen an artist inspired by some boring old coffee grounds? Me either. Maybe if I want to get sophisticated, I need to start drinking more tea. I’m going to have to ask Richard about this.

In the meantime, here we go with yet another very inspiring and beautiful tea bag creation. This is called Cuptea, and it’s created by designer Lee Seo-Jin. According to Yanko Design, “The cover of the tea bag blooms into a beautiful disposable cup for tea.” Someone would do all this with the cover of a tea bag? I guess if you really need a cup to drink your tea from, it would be much easier to take the paper package and make this very intricate origami fold than to grab a cup from the kitchen cabinet (not). I’m just kidding, from a design standpoint, I think this is amazing. However, I do have one more observation about tea and coffee drinkers. Tea drinkers apparently have a lot more time on their hands than coffee drinkers. *wink*