Craft Beer labels

Project Details

For this project students needed to pick one of the following beer names and illustrate a label for it.
1. Duck Duck Gooze – brewed by the Lost Abbey
2. Dead Guy Ale – Brewed by Rogue Ales
3. Purple Monkey Dishwasher (American Porter) – brewed by Evil Genius Beer Company
4. The Hairy Eyeball (American Strong Ale) check out the origin of the phrase…brewed by the Lagunitas Brewing Company
5. Bridge Burner Special Reserve Ale – brewed by Lakefront Brewery, Inc .
6. Brown Chicken Brown Cow – brewed by Quaff Bros
7. Grandmule (American Porter) – brewed by Cigar City Brewing

BRAND: Know/create the brand personality. Ask these 3 key questions:
What is the product?
Who is the customer?
How are they buying it?
In other words, is it an ale or lager? American, German, English? Why should people choose this beer over others? These are all crucial for developing the personality of your brand—and will dictate what specifically you need to communicate through the beer label. Is the beer for craft connoisseurs or young people trying to have fun? More for the post-work happy hour crowd, or free-spirited, music-festival-attending Bohemians?

WRITE UP A PAGE SUMMARY OF YOUR ANSWERS TO THESE QUESTIONS. INCLUDE ANY OTHER RESEARCH. TELL US THE STORY OF THE BEER! See links to “RESOURCES.”

LABEL SHAPE: Instead of a traditional shape and size, for this project you will create a custom (die cut) size – dimensions around 5×5″ Your illustration should include this interesting frame.

HANDDRAWN NAME AND ACCOMPANING ILLUSTRATION (can be mascot, scene, object, etc.) The name of the beer is part of the illustration. Use your own HANDDRAWN TYPE for this. See “RESOURCES” for ideas about this. When drawing the name, it is ok to be inspired by acuall fonts, but DO NOT try to emulate set type. Forget trying to keep it on a straight baseline. Givie it character and personality. Also, combine the name with the rest of the illustration.
Fonts you choose communicate a lot about your brand personality. Serif fonts or script fonts give your label a more classic feel. Sans-serif fonts make it more modern. It can be tempting to go with a really fun, crazy display font, but remember that readability is very important as well. You want customers to be able to read your name so they can remember you. And read the rest of the words on your label so they can make an informed purchasing decision.

IMAGERY: Once you have your style, you can decide on imagery. How do you do that? Figure out what makes you unique. Do you use very specific ingredients? Show them. Have a cat that’s become the brewery’s unofficial mascot? Incorporate him into the design. Using a brewing technique from a specific culture? Utilize design styles from the same region. Have a clever name? Play that up.
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