Bulldog Design: E11even Wines

Our friend, partner and winemaker Andrew Murray believes that wine doesn’t have to be pretentious to be delicious. Using this philosophy, he combined his passion for heavy metal with his expertise in winemaking to create E11even—an awesome collection of wines inspired by the famed rockumentary, This Is Spinal Tap. While the Andrew Murray Vineyards brand was already doing quite well, he came to Bulldog so we could help crank up the volume a notch to… well, an eleven of course.

Bulldog was charged with crafting a brand story as well as redesigning the wine labels and packaging. Our first step in the process was to immerse ourselves in the “research”—watching and rewatching the movie, outtakes, interviews and parodies, reading song lyrics, critics’ reviews and fan sites, and listening to Spinal Tap’s entire discography (as well as co-workers reciting movie quotes from across the room). When we broke out the hairspray and leather pants, we were ready to dig into the project.

We developed a story that married one-liners and verbiage from the movie with easy-to-understand wine language and flavor profiles for a brand voice that’s fun, clever and irreverent. And, the wine labels are a perfect combination of rock-and-roll glam and classic design aesthetics. For that extra kick, the artwork is debossed with a leather texture and highlighted with metallic ink accents for a bottle that has a rock star stage presence.

Like Viv Savage, we think you should have a good time all the time, so turn up the music and pour a glass of Big Bottom Red or Unplugged White. You don’t have to be able to shred the guitar to enjoy the harmonies in the wine, but for goodness sake—put that pinky down.

Photo: Victor Boghossian