In case you’ve missed it, low and no-alcohol drinks are a thing. With over 20% of adults in the UK claiming to be teetotal, abstinence is cool: Brewdog is now Punk AF (that’s ‘alcohol free’), Thomson & Scott’s Noughty is (fairly) nice, and Seedlip is sexy. This sobriety revolution is driven, in part, by the mindfully sceptical Gen Z, turned...
Pizza making is a lot like brand identity design. It has many potential configurations: it can be generic or wildly individual, but fundamentally, it’s systematic, a framework of organised elements. It is a base that holds a variety of communicative assets and techniques (the toppings, if you will). Appeal is determined by how well this is orchestrated, and how well...
The pandemic catalysed the at-home market for a whole host of products. Paired with social isolation, it’s no wonder that one of the markets to benefit would be alcohol. Just like coffee, dried flowers and cleaning products, alcohol was packed down into letterbox-sized parcels and sent through the post. Mail-order cocktails have been a somewhat surprising development. The drama, theatre...
Although its recent rise to popularity has been rapid, running a quick search on ‘kombucha’ reveals that until the 21st century it had seen little category growth since its creation, more than 2000 years ago. For the uninitiated, kombucha is a fermented, non-alcoholic sweetened tea containing vitamins, amino acids and nutrients. This mix of familiarity (as a tea), its sweetness...
According to Sweden’s travel and tourism website, craft beer enthusiasts will discover a ‘smorgasbord’ of artisanal, eco-friendly and organic things to drink there, with more microbreweries per capita than any other country (apart from the UK). Omaka joined the scene in September 2020, at the height of the pandemic, and with a slogan to match its fearless attitude: ‘taste before...
Cutting and creasing since 2010, Think is a design-driven structural packaging agency with an over-arching emphasis on form: ‘the neat bevels, the tight creases, the perfect fit’. The team of cardboard engineers has an international reputation thanks to its portfolio of award-winning work for global studios and brands, from startups to industry leaders, including Marx and Supply (New Zealand), OMSE...
The Kininvie distillery was established in 1990 as a third home for William Grant & Sons – it was initially built to relieve pressure on stock at neighbouring sites in Dufftown. Kininvie Works is a more recent development, created as an innovation arm to develop new recipes and processes. As such it is liberated from the rules and regulations that...
Tangent GC began as a Scandinavian organic garment and shoe care company developing products that intended to increase the life of clothing and footwear, and entered the organic skincare market in 2016. The concern given to the longevity of skin becomes an understandable extension of that original intention. Carl Nas Associates, who have been working with Tangent GC on their packaging treatments for...
The spray paint packaging on shelves in Ukraine is usually sad, and often amusing: ‘sad because someone made it… amusing because someone put it into production,’ Kyiv’s Madcats Agency admits. There’s a riot of colour, a sea of tasteless typography and a catalogue of dreadful names (Auto Email, Body 999 and Rector are among the competition). Mitka is different. The...
Atop of Croatia’s Istria peninsula, just where the land slips into the Adriatic sea sits the tiny small-batch gin distillery of Monachus. Stone shores, botanical covered hillsides, the smell of pine and scattered pin cones characterises the landscape. Drawing on this, the natural history of Istria and the name Monachus, borrowed from Monachus Monachus an endangered Mediterranean monk seal, Swedish design studio Bedow created a...
Tangent GC began as a Scandinavian organic garment and shoe care company developing products that intended to increase the life of clothing and footwear, and entered the organic skincare market in 2016. The longevity of skin being an understandable extension of that original intention. The company’s graphic identity, a typographical system designed by Essen International under the creative direction of Carl Nas, established...
Hair Solutions is an enhancer, made from botanical concentrates, that can be added to any brand of shampoo, personalising it to meet 66 different haircare scenarios through a combination of formulations directed at 6 categories (normal, dry, wavy, flaky and colour-treated and fine) and 11 concerns (brittle, dry, oily, thin, wavy or colour-treated, split-ends, frizz, low-shine or volume issues and curl definition)....