Winning at ecommerce: The boost of strong website design

The heady future of wine labels

How do you design the perfect, catch-all wine label for the 21st-century consumer? A young start-up may well crave contemporary shock value, but Château Lafite is unlikely to embrace funky designs and psychedelic script when its brand equity depends on projecting notions of heritage and storied prestige. The visual language of yesterday – cursive fonts, textured paper and stately imagery – still has an important role to play in a world where consumer expectations vary significantly.

Packaging gets phygital: The rise of QR codes

Quick-response codes (more commonly known as QR codes) have become increasingly widespread in recent years. Even 10 years ago QR codes may have seemed a technological gimmick, with their use on packaging confined to some early adopters and consumer engagement led by novelty. Today, as Cameron Worth, founder and CEO of io.tt, a ‘connected products’ platform puts it, “QR codes are boring”.

Harpers Design Awards 2025 winners announced

In Harpers’ annual celebration of all things design, deserved winners demonstrate the best of packaging style and sophistication. Our Design Awards 2025 showcases innovation across drinks categories from canned wine curiosities to remarkable redesigns.

The perfect package: Bridging producer with consumer

Don’t judge a book by its cover. But we all do. Even better for the bookworm, you can flick through the book first, read a few paragraphs and check out the reviews on the inside cover. All of this is much harder with a bottle of wine or spirits; you can very rarely sample the product before purchasing, so the extent to which the customer is led by the label design and packaging is significant.

Design inspiration: What can BWS categories learn from each other?

Jo Gilbert tallies up the scores on BWS’ shelf appeal and explores what each category could learn from the other.

Harpers Design Awards 2024: The full rundown

Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but great design is a finely tuned skill. Andrew Catchpole highlights the best of the crop at this year’s Design Awards.

Shaking it up with disruptive branding

Rowena Curlewis, head of design agency Denomination, extols the virtues of disruptive branding in a crowded wine and spirits world.

Harpers Design Awards 2022: The results

Judging the package, rather than the liquid within, is always an eye-opening and interesting exercise, and this year’s Harpers Design Awards once again delivered some sublime entries worthy of celebration. Andrew Catchpole dips in.

Headline Hero: Labels for change and Most Wanted Wines

Design linking the liquid in the bottle to a worthy cause has reached a new level, as Andrew Catchpole reports.

Absolut unveils new bottle design amid brand shakeup

Vodka brand Absolut has revealed a new bottle design and remixed flavoured range in what will be the brand’s biggest shake-up since its launch in 1979.

Most Wanted Wines launches new artist range

Globally sourced brand Most Wanted Wines has introduced a new range called the Most Wanted Collective. The collection encompasses five single-varietal wines with labels designed by leading UK artists, including London based street artist Jelly J, contemporary fine artist/painter Chris Hawkes, and fashion designer/illustrator Pete Obsolete.

Calling all entries for Harpers Wine Stars 2022

Harpers Wine Stars awards is gearing up for its early 2022 round of judging, with entries for the competition invited by 14 October this year.

One week left to enter Harpers Design Awards

The race is on with just one week left to enter Harpers Design Awards 2021.

Q&A: Alberto Buratto & Gabriele Stringa, Ferro 13

With quirkily designed labels such as The Hipster, The Gentleman and The Nerd reflecting the personalities behind Ferro 13, this iconoclastic producer also makes wine in a novel way to reveal an engaging benchmark for each region. Andrew Catchpole catches up with two of the co-founders, Alberto Buratto and Gabriele Stringa

Entries now open for Harpers Design Awards 2021

Harpers is delighted to announce that our Design Awards 2021 is now open for entries from all areas of the drinks industry.

Q&A: Professor Gordy Pleyers, Université Catholique de Louvain

Taking drinks design into the realm of neuro-marketing and science, Professor Gordy Pleyers of Mind Insights at Université Catholique de Louvain introduces Andrew Catchpole to the non-conscious cues at play in our taste for wines and spirits

Innovation showcase

James Lawrence rounds up the biggest launches from a tumultuous, yet ever-creative, year

Last call for Harpers Design Awards 2020

Harpers Design Awards 2020, the place for wines and spirits with ultimate shelf-appeal, will soon be rounding up the hopefuls for 2020.

Q&A: Rowena Curlewis, CEO & co-founder, Denomination

Designer Rowena Curlewis talks trends and packaging design in a post-pandemic world. Andrew Catchpole tunes in.