Glarus Signature

Creative Agency: the Labelmaker
Photo: Jordan Jelev
Typography: Bolyar Typecraft Superfamily by the Fontmaker
Project Type: Produced, Commercial Work
Client: Glarus Beer
Location: Bulgaria
Packaging Contents: Beer
Packaging Substrate / Materials: Glass bottle, Paper
Printing Process: Flexography, Foil stamping

Glarus Signature Label Design – the Art Behind Craft Beers

Signature Label Design is the premium range of Glarus Beers where they put interesting, non-traditional craft beers standing out among the others with their exceptional quality and style. My work as a label designer was to create a visual reflection of all these values with my Signature Label Design.

I started with thinking of a very flexible color scheme of my future label as I already knew that these beers will be crafted in very short runs which means that there would be great diversity inside the range. My decision was quite simple yet very effective – I decided to have black background color on all labels and define some accents in my design with specific contrast color to indicate different types of products. As a result all labels in the portfolio are black but each of them shines with specific custom color and depending on this additional color I also decided to change the hot-foil on each label where this was necessary.

Compared to Glarus’ main product range I have made two very significant changes. First I removed Glarus logo from the label and put the whole attention on the bird and second I replaced the metallic foil of the label with very fine and durable paper – Fasson Primecoat by Avery Dennison. I have a lot of experience with this material and I wanted to have it here first because I wanted to have real paper white finish and second because I wanted to play with the black background color by overprinting it with a pattern of mono-line waves of UV mat varnish. This is something I love to do, because it makes a simple paper look like a special custom one at no cost.

The other great advantage in this Signature Label Design was the chance I had to use the new-born Bolyar Typecraft font family by the Fontmaker in all its beauty and complexity. I used the woodcut and shade version of Typecraft to write Glarus and Signature and for almost all other texts I picked Bolyar Rough typefaces to enhance the vintage hand-crafted effect I was looking for. I was surprised with the final result of my Glarus Signature Label Design – it looked absolutely stellar, shining with saturated contrast colors and at the same time looking very solid because of the black background.

The labels were very well-received both by the audience and the brand owners. There are only two beers in Glarus Signature range so far but there is a clear horizon to appear few more within next 12 months. Stay tuned!