Onfire Design – Untitled Wine

“ Lee Winston, an Auckland based winemaker wanted to create a statement. While wines that are made in New Zealand are extremely good and highly regarded, they are very ‘samey’. Same standard varieties and blends. Even those claiming to be different are only doing so through their branding; the wine remains the same. Lee wanted to challenge this by creating unique wine blends with unique branding.

The wine itself is inspired by some of the true great winemakers from France. Lee reinterpreted the blending of various grapes, regions and vintages to create high quality, premium blends that did not adhere to standard varieties.

We created the name and brand story for this disrupting brand. Finding inspiration in the winemaking process, the blends will alter slightly per season depending upon the grapes that are available and tweaks in each recipe. In essence, these wines will always be a ‘work-in-progress’. A fixed name did not do this process justice, hence ‘Untitled’.

A ‘wine editor’ persona was developed for Lee. Similar to a film editor who creates a finished film from multiple shots, Lee creates these blends in a similar fashion with grapes. His ideas and musings are captured in a ‘stream of conciousness’ manifesto. Various parts of the manifesto influence each blend, these are physically joined up with tape to illustrate his hands-on process. Lavish foils, embosses, cap branding and other embellishments have been omitted to create a brash, loud statement against the uniformity of today’s wine industry.”