My dear friends James and Marissa run a classy beer blog called He Drank, She Drank. Knowing that I can be pretty snobby about design, and beer labels, they had me write a guest post critiquing two labels of my choosing. Here’s an excerpt:

Teachers go to great lengths to instill in us the virtue of not judging a book by its cover. This is probably because most book covers are hideous. As a graphic designer, I do, in fact, judge a book by its cover. And if it’s an old book and there are different editions, I’m happy to pay a little more to get a better cover. Aesthetics are important and they quickly communicate a lot about a product.

I was a graphic designer before I ever started drinking beer. So I was a snob about it. Not a snob about the origin of the hops or the richness of the malt, mind you, but about the labels. I would scan the cooler at my local bottle shop, guffawing at the beveled-and-embossed, drop-shadowed, warped-into-an-arc text across some hokey craft company label and move on to something with a little bit more class. Something with a matte label and 2-color design. Was I missing out on some great beer? Should I have picked up yet another bottle of beer with a naturalistic painting of a mountain on it? Am I tricking myself into thinking Brooklyn Beer is better than it is because Milton Glaser designed the label?

Read the rest of the article at He Drank, She Drank.