De Vegetarische Slager

The Vegetarian Butcher is a Dutch manufacturer and retailer of vegetable meat and fish substitutes that aim for “a spectacular structure, bite and taste. Their ideal is to show real meat lovers that they don’t miss a thing when they reduce their meat consumption. Their ambition is to become the biggest butcher in the world, on short notice.”

The logos use retro-style illustration framed by floral borders, referencing works by Art Nouveau artists like Grasset, Van de Velde, Mucha, and Behrens, or, more directly, the decorative tiles on Dutch buildings from the early 20th century — as used for butcher shops, too. The square format with the strong colors underlines this allusion to tiles.

The typeface is the stylistically matching Desdemona, more precisely the Black (i.e. solid) cut of Richard Beatty’s digitization. Read more about Desdemona a.k.a. Quaint on the dedicated typeface page.

One could argue that custom lettering would have been a nicer option than using an off-the-shelf period font. The image below exemplifies the virtues of a typographic solution, though: international variations and other brand extensions can be added in no time.