Bavaria blu
Bavaria blu is a brand of cheese produced by Bergader Privatkäserei in Waging am See, Bavaria. It combines blue mold cheese with Camembert. Introduced in 1972, it is Germany’s market leader in the branded products of blue cheese. [Wikipedia]
Bayreuth, a bold and condensed Fraktur designed by Ernst Schneidler in the 1930s, has been used for the logo and the packaging ever since. In the first decades, the letterforms used for the brand were faithful to the original typeface design. In a redesign done in the 1990s, Bayreuth got simplified, most notably in the ‘B’ or the terminals of ‘b’ and ‘l’.
In the Schneidler monograph, Max Caflisch observes: “In the lowercase [of Bayreuth], there are numerous letter parts which are systematically treated the same way: the top and left parts of a g q and, vice versa, the right parts of b d o p v w or h and y.” This homogenization is amplified in the streamlined revision: the ‘a’ is now almost congruent with ‘v’.
“The first Bavaria blu was very playful and ornate – the way they liked it in the 70s – and the successor design used from the end of 1988 to the late 90s was still very true to the original design.”
“In the 1990s there followed a rather more extensive adjustment to the design: Bavaria blu acquired a new, modern, minimalist look. The brand name lettering and the unmistakable reference to the Bavarian origin were kept.”
“Bavaria blu” in unmodified Bayreuth.
The secondary typeface is Florens by Garrett Boge (LetterPerfect). Waging, the home of Bavaria blu, is about halfway between Bayreuth and Florence – conincidence? The ampersand in Florens apparently was considered too fancy and got replaced.
The local Bergader mountain – the Watzmann – is depicted on the packaging since a redesign in 1998.
