Zesto is a young coffee brand entering the UK market with a dual presence: a café experience and a line of packaged products. With plans to expand to Spain and Dubai, the brand positions itself around a simple promise: delivering rare, carefully sourced specialty coffee from handpicked Colombian farms.

In shaping Zesto’s brand identity, we turned to the everyday rhythms of Colombian culture. The colorful festivals, the zestful music, the lively dance and movement found in the layered ruffles of traditional women’s skirts that offered us a vocabulary of forms and colors. We refined these impressions into colorful scrawling lines inspired by Abstract Expressionism. These lines became the building blocks of the identity, the basis of all illustrations and graphic elements, creating a sense of constant movement and spontaneous joy. As if the designer was also dancing  while making those elements.

We coined the tagline “Wake Up and Boogie” for Zesto, referencing Colombia’s love for two things: coffee and the lively Boogie dance. This playful energy inspired our packaging illustrations. We introduced a cast of characters inspired by street culture: featuring hippies, street musicians, and flirtatious dancers joyfully moving together. Their presence adds a human layer to the brand, suggesting that Zesto Coffee isn’t just a daily dose of caffeine; it’s a daily dose of dance, sparking your zest for life!

This illustration style extended into Zesto’s promotional and branded materials as well. In certain applications, we incorporated visual cues from the cities where Zesto operates, reimagining iconic architectural landmarks through the brand’s joyful color language.

To anchor the system, we designed a bold logotype that reinforces Zesto’s confident tone. It stands firmly within the visual language we built. Zesto’s visual language naturally lends itself to endless storytelling; an identity system capable of evolving creatively for years to come. This flexibility helped the brand earn genuine affection from its audience, turning the simple act of a morning coffee into a brighter and more delightful ritual for coffee lovers.

Zesto’s  visual identity is a kaleidoscopic celebration, bursting with lively colors and dynamic illustrations that capture the essence of Colombian life. The brand delivers a multi-sensory experience; engaging taste, sight, and even suggesting sound and movement; transforming  it into a fully immersive experience.