Citrus Lab
"An ice cream experience with zero waste"
project type
Experience Design
year
2025
my role
Designer
client
-
project overview
The Citrus Lab is a food experience designed around a single provocation: what if consuming something could also make you more aware of what you waste? Built as a pop-up ice cream stand on campus, it used food design as both medium and message, every detail chosen to demonstrate that organic matter can have a second life.
the challenge
The brief was to design an experience centered on food design that made people reflect on waste and its impact on the ecosystems. The harder question was how to do that without lecturing, how to make someone feel something rather than just hear a fact.
Solution
Every touchpoint was an argument. Ice cream was served in containers made from hollowed orange peels, with spoons carved from coconut shells, both fully compostable. Each participant received a symbolic ticket stamped with "0 waste," reframing the act of buying as a conscious choice. The brand identity was developed to feel playful and accessible, because the message lands better when it doesn't feel like a lesson. The stand drew a crowd that moved through the full experience in under an hour. Multiple visitors assumed it was a real business and asked if The Citrus Lab was available for events, the clearest sign that the experience read as fully realized, not like a student project.
