Ngweni Railroad Brewery / Branding

•

The Brief

A client approached us to help with a new startup brewery they had in mind to begin. Based in the Ngweni area of KwaZulu-Natal, close to the Ngweni River and situated almost on top of the old Ngweni railway station - when it came to naming the venture - it was a no-brainer: "Ngweni Railroad Brewery (NRB)".

(This is an ongoing project which has been pushed back indefinitely due to various factors, not least of which is the global COVID pandemic. Though ongoing, I wanted to showcase the progress made so far as the logo is more-or-less finalised and I'm quite proud of the work done.)

Designing the Logo

Drawing inspiration from the locomotive history of the location, as well as trying to indicate that this was a brewery, I almost immediately envisioned the front on of a steam train, with the barley stalks making up the front "cowcatcher" of the train. Through various iterations, and meetings with the client, this concept was discarded. However, it was during this time of tinkering with the logo that I had the idea of turning the chimney of the train into the beer glass - with the head of the beer doubling as the smoke!

Bottle Design

For their first run of beers to be marketed, NRB wanted to go with a truly African theme: "The Big 5". For those unfamiliar with wild animals in Africa; the "Big 5" is the shortened term by which locals refer to: lion, buffalo, rhino, elephant and leopard. Detailed illustrations of several were placed together onto the packaging to present to the client.