Best Package Series Design
2020-2022 Peerick Package Series
Peerick is an Australian family-owned vineyard, located in the dramatic Pyrenees region in Victoria. Their wines are a reflection of the place from which they were sourced, with a focus is on excellence with minimal intervention. Peerick's goal is to create outstanding, premium, fruit driven, hand crafted wines, which express the distinctive flavours of their vineyard and which people want to drink. World-class wines produced sustainably, mindful of the environment and consumers health. The range consists of 5 wines to date as of 2022 – the Reserve Shiraz, the Shiraz, the Cabernet Sauvignon, the Pinot Noir, and the Sauvignon Blanc Fumé. The latest to be released was the Reserve Shiraz in 2021. Peerick takes a holistic approach to their viticultural and wine-making practices, minimising the use of chemicals in the vineyard for pest and disease control. Peerick uses straw mulch on the vines to suppress weeds rather than a herbicide, and established "insectariums", beneficial insect banks, adjacent to vineyard blocks. These are areas of native vegetation where predatory insects can breed up, travel into the vineyard to prey on pest insects and then return to breed. In the wine making process, Peerick's wines are naturally whole bunch fermented using wild yeasts and gently pressed using a hand driven wooden basket press. Use of enzymes, additives and fining agents are limited.
- Year wine was released to market: 2020-2022
- Retail Price: $25.95AUD
- Designed by: The Starship
- Designed for: Peerick
Peerick is an indigenous word, thought to be a derivative of "beeric" which translates as "wild cat", the name given to the area by the Dja Dja Wurrung people. As part of Peerick's holistic philosophy, the client acknowledges the Dja Dja Wurrung as the traditional owners of the land, reflecting their dreaming stories, represented by artwork and design elements on the wine label and in dialogue on the website. The values Dja Dja Wurrung People hold for Country are shaped from their belief systems that all things have a "murrup" (spirit) - water, birds, plants, animals, rocks and mountains. The Dja Dja Wurrung people see the land and its creatures in a holistic way, interconnected with each other and with their people. To this regard, a Dja Dja Wurrung artist, Gary Saunders, was commissioned to create artwork that features prominently on the label, branding, and online and offline touchpoints. Peerick is also committed to restoring biodiversity on the property and healing this country.
The Peerick Wine labels were created to emphasize respect for the original custodians of the land, as well as the client's cultural background and history. With Gary Saunders' artwork running through the labels, it ties the family of Peerick wines together, creating a contemporary set of wine labels that not only stand out to consumers but represent the pride and commitment of Peerick to the land.
Following the client taking over the Peerick vineyard, Starship was asked to rebrand Peerick and create an unusual wine branding concept, something that would grab consumer attention in a vast sea of competition. As Peerick is a small wine producer with a limited budget, the label would have to do the heavy lifting, and create via visual impact consumer interest and emotional engagement that would lead to purchase. Brand-building would have to start from the label as a whole.
We would have to not only express Peerick's commitment to holistic practices and its philosophy of wine-making in an immediately engaging manner, we also had to create a label that would prominently feature Peerick's respect for and acknowledgment of the traditional owners of the land. The label would have to be expressed through a series of wines, creating a premium look for the brand that would not only be distinctly Australian on the shelf, but distinctly Victorian.
Starship was also asked to create something that would not only be memorable, but also feed into the client's cultural background and the shared meaning of the word in Ireland and Australia. The label also had to appeal to a broad range of wine-drinkers, including people who might not be aware of the Pyrenees region. Further, as the client is committed to restoring biodiversity on their property and sustainable development, the wine label had to reflect a link to the land.
Peerick commissioned a Dja Dja Wurrung artist, Gary Saunders, to create a piece that could extend through the branding on the labels and on online and offline touchpoints. The work runs in full over the bottlecaps, with the triskele on the Peerick brand itself, and the connected artwork with triskele and patterns on each label, with the pattern subtly raised from the label with spot UV print effects. The label was also given a subtle texture via deboss, giving it an added sense of ruggedness that connects to the Pyrenees region from which the product was made. The Beeric / wild cat creature featured on the box, a fun nod to the meaning behind the name of the brand.
The overall effect is one of interconnectedness between the family of wines, highlighting Peerick's own holistic brand philosophy, its viticultural practices, and its commitment to the land. The wine not features Peerick's story and thought process on the back label, it also has a series of sliders for tannin, body, flavour and such that would make the wine more accessible to drinkers of any stripe, making it a wine not only for the connoisseurs but for casual drinkers as well.
Since its release, Peerick's wines have won several awards in Australia, including at the Melbourne International Wine competition. While the labels look the most striking when collected together, they're still immediately recognisable on a crowded shelf with their unique artwork, bright colours, and subtle textures.
Since the brand's successful relaunch, Peerick has continued to create more varietals and sub-brands, adding more excellent products to the Peerick wine family.
