Designer Rory Overdorff used Newsagent and Blackbike from Typeverything, Fairley Five and Eight from Ephemera Fonts, and LHF Chicago Script from Letterhead Fonts to create a bold and contemporary bottle design for Kennedy’s Irish Whiskey that emphasizes strong typographic presence.

The typeface’s structured yet expressive forms bring clarity and confidence to the layout, allowing the label to communicate directly and elegantly. The clean composition and modern letterforms of Newsagent anchor the visual identity, making typography the hero of the piece.

Scottish studio Freytag Anderson write about the packaging and brand identity they designed for Woven Whisky:

Visually, we stripped away the clichés. The custom frosted brown apothecary-style bottle is tactile and unexpected. Labels are minimal, each release numbered, named, and paired with its own distinctive graphic—an expression of the blend itself. The core range stands apart with a more pared-back identity, anchoring the brand while the limited editions build intrigue and momentum.

Luzi Type’s Spezia is used on the front of the packaging in all caps, with some details on the back in lowercase. On the website, Spezia also appears in its SemiMono form.

One-off malt whisky that has travelled halfway around the world on a long sea voyage from the island of Tasmania, Australia, where it was distilled and aged, to Jerez de la Frontera, Spain.

Once there, half of the shipment was finished in a very old Oloroso sherry cask and the other half in a Pedro Ximénez one.

The typefaces used are ITC Franklin Gothic, Burgues Script, Clarendon, Caslon 3, and Sackers Gothic.

“I was wondering if I could possibly borrow a cup of Johnnie Walker Black Label.”

Elizabeth Friedlander’s Elizabeth (1937) in use for a 1979 ad for Scotch whiskey. The line at the bottom is in all-caps Trade Gothic.

OLO is a cask strength single malt Scotch whisky by Global Whisky:

Two worlds collide as the taste of Scotland meets the historic bodegas of Jerez, Spain. A selection of the very finest cask strength Scotch whisky finished in Oloroso sherry casks…

Labels and boxes set in Morion Bold.

TT Tricks is part of Aberlour identity, alongside Gotham, FF DIN, Segoe Script and a handful of other typefaces.

Aberlour is a Scottish whisky producer. The company was founded in 1879 and produces more than 3,200,000 liters of alcohol per year. Aberlour whisky is sold in more than 50 countries worldwide.

Advertisement for Johnnie Walker Red Label whiskey, published in the October 28, 1971 issue of Jet magazine. The headline and main copy are set in Trooper Roman with the small print set in Trade Gothic.

Magazine ad for Calvert Extra from 1972, with alcoholic gifts for Tom, Dick and Harry and a combination of Baskerville Old Face and Dutch Initials:

Quit wondering what Tom wants, what size Dick wears, or if Harry likes stripes. Give something everybody likes, nobody returns, and somebody’s already wrapped for you. This timely hint comes from Calvert Extra. The Soft Whiskey.

Tiller and OC Highway are paired on this in-house label design by James Donaldson for Chemist Spirits:

Handcrafted with estate-grown barley aged in new oak barrels and finished in Biltmore wine barrels for a perfectly balanced flavor profile, Biltmore Whiskey captures the timeless elegance of America’s finest and most legendary estate.

The Biltmore wordmark with the descending swash R appears to be based on Aeneas. Century Schoolbook Condensed Bold is used for the “Red Wine Barrels” etc. on the sides of the label (blurred but visible) and Century Schoolbook Monospace is picked for the “Distilled and bottled by” arched type, visible on the left and right sides of the bottom portion of the label.

La Conspiration is a French distillery based in Champagne which produces gin and whisky with an experimental and sustainable approach. Their spirits labels were designed by French agency ABM Studio who used Apoc (Blaze Type) to build the brand identity.

Norlan is “an international brand focused on elevating the whisky drinking experience through design, science, and ritual.”

Axia is a sans serif uniwidth typeface composed of concise letterforms. All of the widths of the roman and italic weights harmonize perfectly with one another without changing the line length. Text set in Light or Black results in the same, economical copyfit.

On the website, Axia is paired with Proxima Nova. The logo appears to be based on Bourgeois Condensed.

The terrace restaurant A-Frame offers classic picnic dishes for lunch or as an evening snack.

In the 300-strong community of Rocheport on the banks of the Missouri lies the Les Bourgeois Winery. It is the third largest winery in Missouri, USA and was one of the first clients of the Hoot Design Company, which is located in neighbouring Columbia.

The winery has a distillery, bistro, restaurant and accommodation, which were all brought together under the new umbrella brand The Blufftop at Rocheport with the help of Hoot in early 2022.

Some of the brands were already established, while others were new with the relaunch. “To ensure that The Blufftop at Rocheport and its nine sub-brands are cohesive, we created ten visual identities that work seamlessly together. With a broad color palette inspired by Missouri’s natural landscape, custom illustrations and a variety of different type families, we developed a visual system that is both distinctive and consistent,” said the founder of Hoot, Kristen Brown. One of the type families that they used is Fontwerk’s West, which Brown considered to be “the perfect complement to our sweeping wordmarks” and according to her, “formed the basis on which we could unite the nine brands under one roof.”

The emotional backbone of the Blufftop brand is formed by the calligraphic Esmeralda from Sudtipos and the graceful serif Sometimes Times from BoulevardLAB; the modernist Alternate forms of Korolev from Device is used as the headline typeface, and Victoria Rushton’s Gautreaux serves for the occasional article or preposition. Together, the font quintet defines a heterogeneous brand family that is both easily accessible and appealing.

Rocheport Distilling Co. Whiskey set in West and Esmeralda

The floral leitmotif of the brand family defines the calligraphic typeface, Esmeralda by Sudtipos and the captions are set in Korolev Alternate.

Nine brands under one roof with Fontwerk’s geometric sans West as a unifying element

On the website, West functions as the main font for navigation, headlines and in the body text.

The Blufftop at Rocheport’s property map makes full use of the font quartet.

Esmeralda and Korolev on coasters

Sometimes Times, Esmeralda and West used for a wine label

A towel featuring Sudtipos’ Esmeralda

Imagine it’s a hot summer night and all you have at hand is tab water. The two things to soothe you are thoughts of the Scottish weather and the sparkling refreshment one can find in French all-caps typesetting.

La Maison du Whisky is not just another spirits vendor, it is the French pioneer with regards to importing those liquors this beautiful country does not produce itself. It all started in the mid 1950s with single malt whisky from Scotland and meanwhile turned into an empire spanning the globe. Inside France LMDW distributes to bars, restaurants, and liquor stores. Retailing is realized through four points of sale in Paris and the website that you can see here.

What is so French about its design is the extensive use of all-caps typesetting, very much aligned with the national tradition. What makes it delightful and elegant is the wide letterspacing — that simple trick so little understood in many other countries.

The website uses three distinct typefaces. The monolinear sans-serif is Futura, here ParaType’s digital revival, and represented by the Book and Medium cuts. As much of modernist inspiration is Acier, the display type used for the rum selection. Originally designed as a dual-color typeface by Cassandre and released in 1930 by Deberny & Peignot, it was digitally revived by Production Type’s Jean-Baptiste Levée in 2010.

The third typeface, the one most of the headlines are set in, is Granville, Light and Regular, equally designed by Jean-Baptiste Levée and released by Production Type in 2015. Granville is a grotesque with notable stroke contrast, rational but not constructivist, thus referring to an earlier stage of the sans-serif category. Typeset in all caps with airy spacing, it conveys style and joie de vivre.

Tchin-tchin !

Acier in use for the page with LMDW’s rum selection

Salim Duriaux-Hogga is an independent bottler who is selecting whisky casks in Scotland to then bottle them under his Whisky Is The Limit (WITL) brand. Hence, the selection of bottles offered by the Genevan brand is coming from a variety of Scottish distilleries, to provide only the best of the best to WITL clients.

Duriaux-Hogga entrusted studio ByVolume to design the labels for WITL bottles. The tasks wasn't easy as it was critical to clearly distinguish the bottles between each other, given the range of flavors and variety of suppliers.

ByVolume came up with a system based on a modular lettering wordmark associated with a broad pastel-hued colour palette, aimed to reflect the limitless possibilities of whisky. Each label also features an abstract landscape overlaid with the drawing of a spirit animal that embodied the character of each whisky. This playful composition is balanced with a more formal serif type, namely SangBleu Kingdom, to display all sensitive informations. The huge outlined digit is the ultimate information put on the bottle, revealing the age of the whisky.

Read more about the case study on ByVolume’s website. SangBleu Kingdom is part of the SangBleu collection, available from Swiss Typefaces.

A new visual identity with different bottles for L’eau des vivants, a traditional French distillery from Lyon-Beaujolais. The distillery’s founder, Florent Vilisques, pays particular attention to the ingredients – they are carefully chosen and used, with the idea of keeping a consistency with the local habits, and the regional species.

In order to account for this fineness and this authenticity, we have elaborated a complete and illustrated artistic direction. It was important to reach passionate people with a strong typographic message, counterbalanced with elegant details in illustrations. Theses graphical contrasts bring deepness and a level of lecture to better discover the different levels of ingredients that composes the bottle. Each range is worked with a different colour and illustrated universe in order to have its own identity. This is a collective and creative approach which allowed the collaboration between several types of job to bring life to these products! Cheers!

I used a French condensed typeface to allow a great flexibility. With its five widths, Origin Super Condensed can be used different mediums to have an efficient typeface footprint that adapts very well to the constraint of a seven-letter mark. Frequently used in the packaging world or paper-making industry because of its accuracy, elegance and clarity: Sackers Gothic was my choice to contrast with the main typeface.

Adobe Jenson is Robert Slimbach’s modern interpretation of the 15th century original created by Nicolas Jenson, a French printer and engraver. I thought that this typeface, classical in appearance, but also traditional and with imperfect aspects, would be perfectly suited to the body text.

Illustrations by Nono Ampuy and photographs by At the design table.

From Gabriel Figueiredo:

Printed in pantone, the labels use engravings printed in black and gray, as a background, in order to guarantee them a sober and elegant look. Each label, in turn, has a characteristic color, present with greater emphasis on the bottleneck, as a way of guaranteeing them a greater ease of distinction in shelves or boxes. On the pantone, the information is engraved with a white hotstamp, which gives a subtle and sophisticated highlight to the typography on the label.

To accompany the logo's triangular serifs and prominent corners, fonts with similar characteristics were chosen to compose the complex hierarchy of information present on the label. Infini, a sans serif inspired by letters carved in stone, was used for the brand positioning titles, while Fazeta, with its very complete family that includes small caps, italics, different optical weights and sizes, was used for the whiskey’s technical information. Finally, Portrait Condensed was used for information with the minimum height required by law.

Alias Harbour is used for the logotype.

During the pandemic, the first Argentine “speakeasy” named 878 reconverted themselves and decided to embark on the project of creating a line of bulk spirits for which they join forces with small local producers. All typography is set in the various weights and widths of Fixture.

F37 Bergman by F37 Foundry in use by branding agency Smörgåsbord for William Grant & Sons.

The independent, family-owned Scottish company distils Scotch whisky and other spirits. Established in 1887 by William Grant, it is now run by his descendants. The identity uses a bespoke version of F37 Bergman for William Grant & Sons as a hallmark of the brand. It is paired with Adobe Caslon or similar for the business card, and Sabon for the website (not pictured).

Bottles for vodka and whiskey from Castle & Key, designed by Stranger & Stranger, who describe their artwork as “Elements of the restored historic distillery adorn every touch point in this crafted range”.

Cako is used for product names and selected lines of information, alongside Harbour. An unidentified set of sans serif capitals that could be either type or lettering is used for the brewery logo and product code.

Packaging design and launch campaign by Megan Perkins for Taylor & Smith Distilling Co. The concept for the distillery identity is based on the contrasting qualities between the location and the product itself. Located in Moonah, the distillery produces experimental spirits that draw on the beautiful natural ingredients of Tasmania’s pristine landscape.

The solution works to hero and reinforce the distillery name. Perkins uses the juxtaposition of the bold typography with the beautiful materials with inherent color integrity to reflect the pure and natural ingredients implied by the Taylor & Smith name. Bold color is also used to achieve strong visibility and communicate the intensity of flavor of Tasmania’s botanicals.

In the word of owner Ben Taylor: “The scale of the season here is more compressed than it is on the mainland. So you get an intensity of flavor in the Botanicals - you get a stronger, more oily essence.”

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