Skellig Distillery exists in one of the most beautiful places on earth – at the edge of the world, on the extreme west coast of Ireland. The Skellig team saw an opportunity to build a brand whose spirit is shaped and formed by both the landscape and the singularly characterful community that lives there. They engaged Trinity to bring that vision to life.
We first created a brand strategy of “The Characterful Journey” as the foundation for everything the new brand would do.We then developed the name for the distillery’s spirits “Skellig Six 18” in reference (and reverence) to the unique feature of the distillery’s land. The 618 ancient steps carved into a rugged crag of rock in the 8th century leading upward to a remote monastic settlement where young monks had once begun their life’s studies. For the brand, those 618 steps would represent the journey of character at its foundation.
The Skellig 618 brand identity lives and breath the landscape. The bespoke letterforms and island silhouette speak to the place and its character. The shapes represent the 618 steps to the summit. The colors speak to the weather and flora and fauna. The visual architecture lives across both the gin and the whiskey. On the gin, the seal speaks to the local botanicals. On the whiskey, the seal features the constellation that represents Skellig’s home in an International Dark-Sky Reserve.
