Press release | For its 25th anniversary, Paris Packaging Week turns to student creativity to rethink beauty packaging codes
Paris, 27 November 2025 – To celebrate its 25th anniversary, Paris Packaging Week 2026 will spotlight a new generation of designers, engineers and creatives on 5–6 February at Paris Expo Porte de Versailles.
Through four student competitions, this anniversary edition places innovation cat the heart of its strategy, giving schools free rein to imagine the beauty packaging of the coming decades.
Through the organisation of these competitions, Paris Packaging Week showcases the breadth of skills mobilised by these emerging talents: engineering, design, regulatory analysis, logistics optimisation, understanding of ESG challenges, materials innovation and project management.
It offers a concrete demonstration of how training programmes are preparing immediately operational professionals, capable of navigating a demanding industry, addressing environmental challenges and supporting the technological and regulatory transformations of the sector.
Focus on the “Emballé 5.0” competition of the Conseil National de l’Emballage (CNE)
The Conseil National de l’Emballage presents the 2026 edition of its student competition “Emballé 5.0”, dedicated this year to eco-designed packaging solutions tailored to seniors. Teams are invited to identify the difficulties faced by older users, then imagine an innovative, useful and transferable concept. The 40 projects, created by teams of 2 to 4 students and assessed on creativity, usefulness, environmental performance and regulatory coherence, will be reviewed by a jury bringing together representatives of the CNE’s six sectors, design experts and specialist journalists. Finalists will present their solution on 6 February 2026 during Paris Packaging Week, ahead of a public vote. The competition offers winners visibility among professionals and opportunities to connect with companies in the sector.
“With Emballé 5.0, we activate a strategic lever: connecting future talent with the highly operational challenges of eco-design. By working on the experience of seniors, students confront innovation with a real market need and reinvent key uses. Their fresh perspective energises the sector and inspires solutions that can be applied directly,” emphasises a delegated member of the Conseil National de l’Emballage.
A reflection between heritage and innovation for ESEPAC students
For this new edition, ESEPAC – the European School of Packaging – invites its students to reinvent cosmetic packaging by bringing heritage and innovation into dialogue. Under the theme “Résonances”, participants develop concepts inspired by ancestral and cultural practices, reinterpreted with today’s tools: eco-design, emerging processes, AI and new uses.
Organised around three areas — make-up, skincare and fragrance — the competition involves three groups of three Master’s students, evaluated on several criteria: the quality and boldness of their creative work, technical relevance, and their ability to reinvent an archetype while anticipating future market needs.Prototypes and oral presentations will be assessed in December 2025, with awards handed out in early 2026. This edition has been designed as a bridge between heritage, innovation and design culture.
“Résonances gave students the opportunity to explore uses by weaving a link between past, present and future. Their work, combining material blends and cultural inspirations from around the world, shows how traditional references can be translated into relevant, operational packaging solutions for tomorrow,” explains Marion Freycon, Pedagogical Coordinator at ESEPAC.
Beauty gestures reimagined by IUT Évreux students
With future PPWR 2030 regulations as their guiding thread, third-year students of the BUT Packaging, Emballage & Conditionnement (PEC) programme at IUT Évreux will present a responsible packaging innovation at the show: a compact “Reduce-first” mascara designed to reduce mass and volume while increasing capacity (+50% compared with the standard) thanks to a 15 ml HDPE bottle and a compressible cap.
To mark the 25th anniversary of PCD, IUT Évreux will also exhibit:
• a fragrance bottle inspired by the spirit of Steampunk and Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
• the compact mascara,
• a luxury gift set in the style of an Advent calendar, containing 24 products provided by partner brands and celebrating the show’s anniversary through creativity and innovation.
For this anniversary edition, ESI Reims proposes an ambitious competition: designing a turnkey premium fragrance launch, encompassing design, engineering, sensory storytelling and environmental considerations.
Students are developing all components of the project — bottle, carton, box, POS display — with near-professional precision: sketches, creative research, 3D renderings, materials and process files, technical drawings, industrial costings, and a circularity strategy (recyclability, refill, sourcing).
Organised into five specialised groups (caps / neck / pump; bottle body and decoration; carton; inserts; box / POS), they are working from a contemporary floral olfactory pyramid (mandarin, grapefruit, rose, jasmine, white musk, cedar…) that guides both the sensory and visual dimension of the project. Five boards will be exhibited at the show and evaluated by the jury.
Training tomorrow’s talent to transform the packaging industry
The 2026 edition stands out as a particularly strategic milestone for the packaging ecosystem. With this year’s focus on areas dedicated to refill, circularity and emerging technologies, the show clearly positions responsible innovation as a driver of transformation for the beauty, luxury, beverage and aerosol markets. The convergence of the four shows — ADF, PCD, PLD and Packaging Première — enriched by the Pentawards Festival, creates a comprehensive platform where design, engineering and forward-looking vision intersect.
Supported by record exhibitor participation and an expanded programme, this edition highlights a sector undergoing major reinvention, where creativity, technical performance and sustainability are becoming the new standards. A dynamic that reinforces Paris Packaging Week as an essential hub for anticipating new uses, accelerating projects and capturing weak signals from future market.
Paris Packaging Week 2026
Paris Packaging Week offers a tailored experience through its four market-specific exhibitions, each dedicated to a key sector of the packaging industry:
- ADF – the leading event for the aerosol and dispensing systems market
- PCD – the global meeting place for beauty packaging, spanning skincare, makeup, haircare and fragrance
- PLD – the essential event for premium and luxury drinks packaging
- Packaging Première – dedicated to luxury packaging for fashion, watches, jewellery and fine food
- Pentawards Festival – the global celebration of design and creativity in packaging.
Visitor registration is now open – free of charge – at parispackagingweek.com.
Practical Information
- Dates: 5–6 February 2026 (Innovation Awards Gala Party: 4 February)
- Venue: Paris Expo Porte de Versailles, Hall 1
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