The Botanical Illustration course showed a way to better know and identify different plants. We learned techniques to observe and illustrate nature using different media.

This expertise module taught the basics of botanical illustration and how it can be applied to design products.

Basics

The goal of this expertise was to learn new techniques and find our own style. At the beginning we did exercises with watercolors to get to know this method better. The next tasks were to combine fineliner, pencil and watercolors to achieve the most versatile results.

Concept

After the first exercises, we should come up with a concept of how to apply an illustration of plants to a graphic product.

Since I like to drink whisky and find the packaging interesting I decided to design a whisky label.

Even if the quality of the raw materials for the whisky production, such as the grain or the water and the prudent malting and artful distillation also decide how good a whisky will be in the end, the maturation in the barrel has a special significance. It is said that about 70 percent of the flavor of a single malt whisky is created during barrel aging.

This provides the basis for the illustration, on the one hand, the barley as the main ingredient and, depending on the flavor or barrel, other plants illustrated on the label.

This provides the basis for the illustration, on the one hand, the barley as the main ingredient and, depending on the flavor or barrel, other plants illustrated on the label.

The label should in a certain way give an indication of the taste and the production process.

Product

The final product is different packaging for the fictitious whisky brand Glenwooden.

It's the most powerful, complex, versatile, beautiful, best single malt you've ever smelled. Glenwooden is a small family whisky distillery from the Great Glen in the north of Scotland, near the Highlands, a pristine landscape of stormy heights, peaceful lochs and rough seas. With only one road, one pub, one distillery and a very special microclimate, it is not easy to produce whisky here. This unique location and climate make for a one of a kind whisky experience. Only a limited number of bottles are produced each year, which makes this whisky even more special.

There are two product series, one is the light-coloured bottles with a light-coloured label. The light series is intended for whisky beginners and people who prefer mild, sweet and fruity whiskies.

And the series in the dark bottles. It is significantly smokier and peatier in taste. The perfect combination for whisky lovers.

In order not to be irritated by the colour of the whisky, the bottle is deliberately kept dark. The raw spirit of the whiskey, the New Make, is colorless at the moment it drips from the still. So the possibility of color can only follow afterwards. And there only the barrel waits. When the whiskey matures in it, it draws chemical compounds from the wood that give it its color.