This content was originally published by The Hop Review, a digital magazine that joined the Hop Culture family in March 2020.
This piece was written by Jack Muldowney.
LONDON, UK
Brew by Numbers is a high-quality, ingredients-focused brewery on South London’s Bermondsey Beer Mile (which we first covered from a visit back in 2015). Founded by Tom Hutchings and Dave Seymour in 2011, their approach was to highlight numerals in their branding, specifically four called out on each of their beers: the first two representing the beer’s style and the last two the recipe number.
The world-renowned design agency,
Pentagram, was approached to redesign their visual identity and packaging system. As described on the studio’s website, they “created a concept that fully embraced BBNo’s cataloging system, using it to define the brand, making each number the hero; and reshaped the hierarchy and pulled focus to the beer style using large typography.”We even got a little taste of some of their new beers and can designs, by way of BBNo’s Coffee Porter (No. 10), which we highlighted in our March 2019 Hop Reviews.
“Our approach is designed to make it easier for customers to recall the products,” explains Creative Director Marina Willer, on Pentagram’s project page. “By accentuating the style of the beer over the brew numbers, the system will allow drinkers to latch on to the varieties they like, without removing the identity that makes Brew by Numbers so special.”
In a beer landscape where the more cartoonish and abstract seems to be getting preference, it’s really refreshing to see a brewery stick to their concept and remain minimalistic in its aesthetic. Hats off Pentagram, and BBNo.
“As the name suggests, BBNo’s idea and story revolve around numbers – in fact, the entire catalogue is built around a system of numbers. Each beer is identified by a four-digit number with the first set indicating the beer style and the second set denoting the recipe.
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“Our approach is designed to make it easier for customers to recall the products/ By accentuating the style of the beer over the brew numbers, the system will allow drinkers to latch on to the varieties they like, without removing the identity that makes Brew by Numbers so special.”
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Images from Pentagram.com.