Featured image for Westward Whiskey's Redesign From Pearlfisher Showcases Its Oregonian Origins

Westward Whiskey's Redesign From Pearlfisher Showcases Its Oregonian Origins

by Rudy Sanchez on 05/05/2021 | 2 Minute Read

Westward Whiskey is an Oregon-based distillery that produces single malt American whiskey from Ale brewed with local Northwestern ingredients. 

Produced for nearly two decades, the craft spirit brand’s distinctive process utilizes new, lightly charred oak barrels, unlike traditional single malts. While the product showcases the local Northwestern ingredients like locally grown barley and water from the Columbia River, the branding and packaging lacked that same level of regional influence. That's why Westward partnered with agency Pearlfisher to imbue more of the distillery’s spirit and locale into its branding and packaging.

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The logo retains its core concept, an uppercase W with an arrow pointing west through it. However, they have refined it, and it now denotes northwest, a nod to iron deposits in Oregon throwing compasses a few degrees off. The sans type gets replaced with a more elegant serif, and they added sharp edges to the label. Copper also gets incorporated into the design, a reference to the copper stills used in the distillation process. They also chose to deemphasize some of the copy on the original bottle, allowing the redesign itself to tell the brand's story. 

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The teal of the label finds inspiration in the Columbia River Gorge, and they based the mountains on a photo taken by Westward's founder. Rather than use a smooth-shouldered and cylindrical bottle, the new vessel features a squarer, stronger shape, with a shorter but more spacious neck and cragged edges that also call back to the Columbia River. “True Northwest” is stamped on the bottle between labels, solidifying the whiskey’s provenance.

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Whereas the old packaging and branding felt adequate ( if somewhat generic), the new branding immediately demonstrates the rugged spirit of Westward’s Oregonian roots. The new packaging immediately showcases the premium nature and Pacific Northwest origins, also setting an expectation for the premium single malt whiskey contained inside.

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