#beerlabeldesign

REFINING IDEAS

Further development of the brand mark for BREWMAID Beer Co:

EXPERIMENT & REFLECT: LOGO FIRST DRAFT

First draft of a possible logo:

After some reflection and discussion with my lecturer about hierarchy, I decided to reduce the size of the hops symbol and place above the type.

EXPERIMENT & REFLECT: DIGITISING MY SKETCHES

As mentioned previously, I wanted to take my original pen sketches into illustrator.  My initial thoughts were to create a brank mark or possibly a repeat pattern..

Below is some of my development work so far:

From this....

To this....

This was an idea that I had in my head for a while and I used my graphics tablet to draw freehand.  I felt like the hops symbol would make a really good brand mark - I took inspiration for the fire from a tattoo illustration I had come across during the research process.

With this design, its fairly rough but I was really happy to get it out of my head and down on paper.  I felt the hops shapes were too ‘rounded’ in this first draft and this was something I was keen to develop.

For this version I decided to image trace the hops to create a more clean illustration - really happy with how this turned out.

REASEARCH/ EXPERIMENT & REFLECT: 

PASSION PROJECT 2.0

At this point in my project, I decided to go out into the real world in search of craft beer on the shop shelves, so off the Sainsbury’s I went.  I think it was really important for me to observe other brands in the marketplace and see what type of designs stood out to me.

Below are images of the brands that I was drawn to:

This was a really useful trip and I think what stood out for me the most was the use of bright colours and strong use of type on the cans - this is something I already considered in my own designs so I feel reassured that I'm on the right track.

Feeling inspired, I decided to have a look at possible fonts for my brand - I lost days to this, but at least I've made a start right??!! :)

These are by no means the final choices, I was just having a play around and I feel like I need to see the font alongside my designs to make an educated choice.

EXPERIMENT & REFLECT: PASSION PROJECT 2.0

At this point in my project, I decided to refine some of my ideas as I felt like I didn't really have a clear focus.  Following my initial research and further discussions with the client, a clear theme/trend had emerged.  

I decided to mock up another moodboard to present to the client to show a clear representation of his ideas and confirm this new design direction -  I also find it much easier to take inspiration from visuals.

Some of my initial ideas in terms of design are still present in this new moodboard, however I have a clearer idea of the direction I would like to take.  I think its clear that my client is very much inspired by Americana - dive bar aesthetic, muscle cars, cheesy 80/90′s action movies and strong branding with a focus on typography or a recognisable brand mark.  My client was keen that I use strong, bold, bright colours as he feels this represents the strength of flavour and quality of the beer.

With all of this in mind, I decided to start by focussing on ingredients, below are some of my initial design ideas:

Initially I had a couple of ideas that I wanted to take forward based on the new moodboard detailed above.  In terms of ingredients, I was really drawn to botanical illustrations, I felt the detail represented the complexity and quality of flavours that my client had discussed.  Another idea was around tattoo design, I felt this was a fun and different way to represent the dive bar aesthetic without being too obvious or unoriginal.   I love the old style, traditional tattoos and thought this might be a possible logo or brand mark, weaving in the brand name and also ingredients in some way - I have an idea in my head what this might look like but at this point I don't have anything down on paper yet!

Going back to ingredients, below are a few initial fine line botanical style drawings that I attempted: