As we drew together the concepts that would eventually form BRIGHTER LATER®, our visual identity and language was a crucial part of the vision. We wanted to create something that looked as though it was always meant to be. As it is when it was.

The vision was the create something simple and clean that looked as though it had always existed - modern yet timeless. After years as bartenders, we had watched what we jokingly refer to as the 'backbar arms race', more gold foil, brighter colours, more unusual bottle shapes. 

We chose to move in the opposite direction, opting for simplicity and a sense of quiet luxury. With this in mind, we engaged The Company You Keep, an agency with a reputation for building 'brands that speak, rather than shout'.

Using typography as a foundation and building a language to evoke half-remembered fragments of conversation, a familiar place we’ve yet to visit, the feeling of knowing yet not knowing, we began work on our visual identity. We wanted the brand to feel almost familiar, as though from a daydream, if you could just pin it down. The idea was to use language rather than imagery, with the picture only being completed in the mind of the reader.

Senior Designer Jordan Dolheguy, the creative mind behind our branding, came up with our core range text lockup, using Europa Grotesk, a font originally drawn by Scangraphic back in the 1970s. It was one of their earlier type-faces to be translated digitally and echoes the typographic treatments used in classic fashion labels such as Helmut Lang.

Each lockup consists of a name, a description and our version of tasting notes. Instead of explicitly telling the drinker what to expect, we chose to talk about what the drink evokes.

Next time you pick up a bottle, have a read and take a moment to appreciate the understated yet thoughtful creative work of The Company You Keep.