How Thirst gave East London Whisky its edge

East London Liquor Company has launched its first blended whisky, and the pack design is as much a statement about place as it is about product. Created by Glasgow-and New York-based agency Thirst, the bottle for East London Whisky deliberately sidesteps the windswept-coastline visual language that has long defined this category, replacing it with something louder, with more layers and grit.

The brief, as Thirst describes it, was deceptively straightforward: create a disruptive design for a new blended grain whisky that could sit confidently at an accessible premium price point, and feel worth it in the hand. The challenge was communicating quality without resorting to the usual signals of heritage and restraint. In my mind, that's lots of brown, woodland creatures and serif fonts. And as Thirst's Creative Director, Sam Cutler, puts it: "Whisky can feel like it's trapped in an old-world idea of premium. This needed to feel worth it without becoming precious."

The creative strategy Thirst developed – which they call Exquisite Clash – draws directly from East London's urban character: old boozers right next door to new-world restaurants, Victorian detail against concrete tower blocks, layers of history forever evolving. That cultural tension became the engine for a visual identity that favours a heap of contrast, texture and contemporary energy over any idealised notion of provenance.

Research went beyond the usual moodboards. Senior Designer Alex Page and the client spent a day on an "urban safari" through East London, photographing overlooked textures, signage, typography, architecture and "accidental beauty in the everyday". The ensuing material all fed directly into the final execution, which is deliberately tactile and dimensional: embossing, micro-embossing, spot varnishes, foil details and die-cut shapes combine bold typographic structure with collage-like layering and bursts of neon energy.

The result is a product design that works at two distances... From across a bar, you see it instantly. In the hand, it deserves closer attention, answering the unspoken question a shopper might ask at the shelf: why is a £42 bottle worth it? That value, the designers argue, isn't performed through faux tradition; it's built through materiality and craft.

The client was happy, too. Alex Wolpert from East London Liquor Company said: "The creative strategy development was where Thirst's expertise really shone – it was a healthy interrogation of what makes up the fundamental DNA of East London Liquor."

The launch marks a pretty hefty expansion of the East London Liquor Company's whisky credentials, bringing its signature flavour-first approach to a broader audience and building on the distillery's decent reputation. Supported by a programme of events and activations across London, the release has drawn a strong response so far, boosting whisky sales and establishing a more confident platform for its next chapter.

It's the kind of brief any discerning studio would snap up. And Thirst was only too happy to develop an identity for a product so linked to its heritage and place that any of the usual premium signals wouldn't have made sense.