What if Design and Beer Supported the Outdoors.
Designing for the Community
Vasen has supported the outdoor community here in RVA since day one. If you haven’t heard of these people yet, I would highly recommend checking them out! Whether it’s supporting women through the outdors or sponsoring local triathlons for universal access to the river, Vasen is killing it and with great beer too!
So when the opportunity came to design beer flights for one of my favorite breweries, I jumped on it. Together we decided these three elements were the most important.
Scandavian Culture- Vasen was built on Scandavian culture and beer. How can we make sure the history is preserved and evident?
Ergonomics- Always a big one for physical products. In this case for both sides of the bar: bartenders and customers.
Education- sour beer has a lot of complexity behind the flavors. How can we make sure each beer was celebrated when ordered?
Ideation
The fun funnelling and experimentation process begins! With the founder of Vasen having an engineering background, I quickly jumped into quick rendered drawings to illustrate the various concepts. This also helped to ensure the flight board was designed for manufacturing from the get go. From there, prototyes of the top ideas where produced and changes where made in real time during in person meetings. Slowly but surely all the little details were getting grinded out, from how a filled glass would interact with the board to edge conditions.
Final
The final flight board was made from ambrosia maple, to create that extra touch of individuality to each board. Have to love those gorgeous lines from the beetles! Aside from the unique patterns on the wood, the ambrosia maple was strategically sought for it’s intrinsic hardness factor and tight grains. Red oak would be chosen for the tapered legs. This would create a contrast from the maple color and allow for the flight board to visually float and appear lighter. A Sami inspired design would be laser etched onto the wood to tie the design into it’s Scandinavian roots and lastly a hidden groove allowing consumers to read about each beer through integrated educational cards. End project was made possible as a collaborative effort with the following names in Richmond: Scott from Kugo Laser; Christopher from Timberwolf; and 903 Creative.
Bonus Project! Holiday Set
To kick off the holidays, a matching set of etched glasses were deisgned and created. Graphics were again created by the wonderful 903 Creative. Rotary design prep, manufacturing, and finishing would be done solo this time around. Special thanks to Build RVA for the wonderul access to their rotary and lasercutter.
