When Nature, Art and Beer Come Together...

Some of our friends think we don't work for a living. After all, we just sit around and draw pictures all day, right? Oh yeah, and we travel to National Parks to take photos and sketch. We surf the internet "doing research" about places that everyone wants to visit. When our friends look around our offices and see travel guides, trail maps, beer cans and bottles, they wonder if we actually have jobs at all.

We LOVE what we do—and we are very blessed that our passion for beauty, creativity, adventure, nature, and good beer happen to be part of a day's work. Take our client Uinta Brewing Co. from Salt Lake City, Utah—they saw the illustrations in our National Parks poster series and coffee table book and hired us to help them revamp all of their beer bottles, cans, and packaging.

Fortunately, our research involved sampling dozens of their craft beers to get familiar with the flavor profiles of each of the brews that needed new or updated packing art. We worked on the project for most of 2016—and we enjoyed every minute of it!

The project went something like this: Uinta gave us a broad vision of where they were going with their brand evolution. (It's great when a client really knows who they are and where they are headed!) This is how they described the Uinta brand:

"A craft beer brand rooted with a love and appreciation for outdoor recreation and adventures. We have a deep love for great beer and believe that great beer deserves great packaging."

They sent us samples of existing packaging and current beer flavors to taste. They gave us a list of new flavors that were in development with descriptions and flavor profile info for beers that were not available for tasting.

They gave us ideas about the look and feel they wanted for each flavor, and then they turned us loose to sketch. We supplied multiple rough sketches for each concept.

They picked a fave, and we started rendering the art with pen and ink. Once the line art was approved, we vectorized the art and finished up on the computer using Adobe Illustrator.

There were so many different flavors of beer in the lineup! Each one had a unique style, theme and flavor profile while keeping with Uinta's overall vibe of adventure, friendship and taste. All the label illustrations had to reflect the individual characteristics of each brew—so we had a lot of fun exploring new color combinations, scenic themes and moods.

After we finished the art for all of their regular packaging, they asked us to illustrate a special series of National Park beer cans that would celebrate some of the America's greatest outdoor spaces.

What could be more fun than getting paid to sample more beer, do more travel and research about National Parks, and then create illustrations that would become poster art AND adorn beer cans, 6-packs, and who knows what else?

So if our parents are reading this blog post, YES—we really are working. YES—we actually get paid to drink beer, climb mountains and draw pictures. YES—we are having a lot of fun while we make our clients happy. Here is what Lindsay Berk, our contact at Uinta, had to say:

"Working with Anderson Design Group has been an exciting process. It’s rare to find a small group with such expansive talents and an art form that aligned so well with our brand. We’re grateful to Joel and team for their ability to align with our vision to deliver iconic illustrations that both capture and intensify experiences. The Anderson Group has been a great partner in “Uinta-fying" our packaging and we’re excited to continue working with them on more Park Beers and other future beer labels."