BRANDING, PACKAGING, PATTERN DESIGN, & ILLUSTRATION

We created a brand identity and a full line of packaging designs for Crust & Crave, including custom patterns, illustration, and iconography.

Crust & Crave offers artisanal baking mixes inspired by European heritage, delivering bakery-quality bread at home. We built a unique visual identity to ensure they stand out in the food product space.

Brand Identity

Our goal when crafting Crust & Crave’s logo system was to create a classic, European heritage brand aesthetic with a modern twist. The logo font is a custom made, vintage style serif with calligraphy inspired ligatures. The brand’s ampersand mark features a center twist detail, a nod to their signature bread: the Swiss braided loaf.

Packaging Research

Crust & Crave’s brand story is closely tied with their cultural heritage. Their recipes are crafted in Switzerland, though each loaf originates from various European countries. We conducted extensive research to ensure that the products were not only eye-catching, but that the packaging visually represented each bread’s rich history. Each bread features a unique color scheme, pattern design, and ornate frame illustration.

Golden Braid

Their signature loaf is the braided bread, Zopf or Züpfe. Originating in Switzerland, we referenced Swiss craftsmanship, embroidery, and textiles when designing the pattern and illustrated frame. The package features the important cultural symbol of the edelweiss: a mountain flower found in the alpine region.

Country Crust

While country style loaves are common in many cultures, this recipe is based on the Swiss Schweizer Bauernbrot. Our visual inspiration was a rustic farmhouse aesthetic, referencing Swiss clothing and lace trim for pattern work. We chose to particularly focus on lattice and gingham patterns, as they mirror the crossed scoring found on country loaves.

Market Discovery

We started by exploring retail shelves, analyzing recurring industry themes. Crust & Crave’s product is unique within the American market, so while they may not have a large amount of direct competitors, we still need to ensure they stand out on a busy shelf.

Wholegrain Wonder

Wholegrain bread, known as Vollkornbrot, is common within Swiss, German, Austrian cultures. Inspired by Bavarian and Austrian pattern work, we particularly wanted to depict botanical elements as a representation of the bread’s natural, health-forward roots.

Final Packaging

Iconography

As part of our fully custom packaging design, we created unique icons and graphics for information callouts and the baking instructions. One of the most important graphics is the hand drawn, step-by-step braiding guide for the Golden Braid label.