Matamaal
Services
VISUAL DESIGN
DESIGN SYSTEMS
UI/UX DESIGN
Year
2026
Info
K&M - Kanz and Muhul is an authentic Kashmiri food brand taking its spices from Indian kitchens to shelves overseas.
The challenge: build packaging that felt unmistakably Indian, rooted in where each spice actually comes from, while still holding its own next to international brands on a foreign retail shelf.
timeline
6 weeks
Before moving into sketches or detailed design, I start by creating a moodboard that helps translate the initial brief into a clear visual territory. For Matamaal, I explored references across typography, colour, illustration, composition, patterns, and packaging aesthetics, looking for ways to balance the richness of Kashmiri culture with a contemporary and approachable visual language.
The moodboard acts as a starting point for conversation rather than a fixed design solution. I present multiple visual directions to the client, allowing us to explore what feels most relevant to the brand and the story they want the packaging to communicate. This stage helps us discuss the visual language early, before investing time in detailed execution.
Through this collaborative process, we narrow down the direction that best captures the intended personality of Matamaal. Together, we establish the key elements that will guide the design from the type style and colour palette to the illustration approach, composition, and overall visual character of the packaging.
Once the direction is approved, it becomes the creative foundation for the next stage of the process. With the visual language established, I can move into sketching and explore how these ideas can translate into a distinctive and cohesive packaging system across the different masalas.
The moodboard brought together visual references rooted in Kashmiri craft, traditional ornamentation, botanical forms, and the richness of spices. The aim was to create a visual language that felt authentic to Matamaal’s heritage while still being distinctive and contemporary enough for a modern retail shelf.
Through the exploration, we aligned on a direction built around ornate illustration, warm earthy colours, expressive typography, and intricate decorative details. These elements became the foundation for developing the packaging illustrations and overall visual system.
Direction locked:
Illustration — Hand-drawn, heritage-inspired botanical and cultural elements
Typography — Characterful display type paired with a clean supporting typeface
Colour — Deep, earthy tones with warm spice-inspired accents
Visual language — Ornate, crafted and distinctly Kashmiri
With the visual direction locked, I moved into the exploratory stage, translating the selected moodboard into a tangible visual language through pencil and paper.
I explored different botanical elements, spice forms, Kashmiri motifs, decorative borders, and packaging compositions to understand how the illustrations could work together as a cohesive system. Different variations of the key ingredients were also studied to find forms that felt both recognisable and visually distinctive.
Alongside individual illustration studies, I experimented with how these elements could be arranged on the pack testing framing, hierarchy, illustration placement, product naming, and decorative details across multiple compositions.
Rather than moving directly into a final design, these iterations helped narrow down the strongest visual approach. The selected direction was the one that best balanced Kashmiri character, illustration richness, product clarity, and consistency across the entire masala range.
With the illustration direction established, the next step was to build a typographic system that could hold its own alongside the detailed artwork. The typography needed to feel rooted in Matamaal’s Kashmiri heritage while remaining clear, contemporary, and easy to read across the packaging.
The primary display typeface brings a distinctive, characterful presence to the brand and product names, giving the packs a strong visual identity on shelf. It is paired with a clean secondary typeface to create contrast, improve readability, and bring structure to supporting information.
I also explored the relationship between the typography and the decorative illustration language, using ornamental details and considered spacing to make the type feel integrated into the overall visual system rather than treated as a separate element.
The final hierarchy establishes a clear reading order brand name, product name, product type, and supporting information allowing the rich illustrations to remain expressive without compromising clarity.
With the typography and illustration style established, I developed a colour palette that could bring warmth and character to the packaging while staying rooted in the visual language of Kashmiri craft and spices.
The palette combines earthy greens, warm reds, saffron orange, muted golds, soft creams, and deeper clay tones. These colours draw from the natural ingredients, traditional textiles, architecture, and rich visual heritage associated with Kashmir, while giving the packaging a contemporary and cohesive feel.
Rather than assigning one colour to the entire range, the palette was designed to create variation across different masalas. Each product can take on a distinct accent colour while maintaining the same overall visual language, allowing the individual packs to stand apart while still reading as one Matamaal family.
The final palette also works alongside the detailed illustrations, providing enough contrast for the artwork and typography to remain clear without overpowering the handcrafted character of the packaging.
