Did you know that over a hundred tiny Praying Mantises spill out of one egg case when they hatch? It’s quite spectacular, and then you need to quickly release all but one or two into the wild. These little guys are carnivorous and very hungry. If you don’t give all of them all plenty to eat, they’ll feast on each other. Hey, a little sibling rivalry never hurt anyone, right?

The Praying Mantis Pagoda, obvious by its name, was to have an oriental flair. So I used a Buddhist temple, or tower, as inspiration for the logo, and created a custom font.

The Japanese writing on the base of the logo says “Praying Mantis Pagoda” repeatedly… how original.

At the same time I was working on the packaging, I was to create the look of the product itself. This needed to be done quickly so that it could be manufactured while I worked on everything else. I designed the base of the habitat, the pattern for the frame, and a little oriental lantern that would hang in the center of the habitat to hold the egg case while waiting for it to hatch.

I then had to create the illustrations for the Pagoda instructions.

Put it all together with a cute kid photo shot, some illustrated mantises, the essential legal mumbo-jumbo, and you’ve got yourself a bona fide product with packaging that fits well with the Insect Lore look.