Sagada Cellar Door
Awakening the Spirit of the Cordilleras
Client
Sagada Cellar Door
Service
Visual Identity, Packaging
Industry
Retail
Collaborators
CIA Bootleg Manila
Sagada Cellar Door is a local brewer and small-batch distillery nestled deep in the Cordillera mountains. The brand is shaped by its place of origin. Every bottle is filled with locally grown and foraged ingredients, mountain spring water, and artisanal processes tied to the land itself. The brand was built around a single, uncompromising idea: to awaken spirits with Sagada's soul. It serves not just as a tagline, but as a design directive that asks for every element to carry the weight of place.
The Context
Sagada is not simply a location but rather an experience. It is known for its stillness, its landscape and the culture that is felt wherever you step foot. We had the opportunity to translate this experience into a brand that could speak to people who had been there, and draw in those who hadn't yet.
Working with brand strategy partner CIA Bootleg, the brief asked us to take a deeply rooted sense of place and make it portable by building a visual identity that could resonate beyond the mountains while remaining unmistakably, honestly Sagada.
A Doorway Into Sagada
The central motif of the packaging is a doorway. A doorway that pulls the viewer in and invites them to enter a quieter, more intentional world. It is shaped by the arched structure of the label and lives within the logotype itself: a double-o ligature that subtly draws the eye inward, as if beckoning.
Pattern as Place
The patterns surrounding the packaging are drawn from Cordillera artistry, Kalinga clay pot motifs and the local landscape, all of which carry cultural meaning and historical depth. Foil accents are also used selectively around the packaging to add a tactile and ceremonial quality without overwhelming the handcrafted feel.
Each variant is distinguished through color and illustrated key ingredients, plants and botanicals that were cultivated in the Cordillera’s cold, high-altitutde climate.
A woven monogram drawn from Sagada’s caves and hanging coffins adds more elegance and mystery. Mystery that is tied to the allure of Sagada.
A Bottle Worth Keeping
For tourists, the bottle becomes a keepsake, a physical memory of a place that is difficult to put into words. For Filipinos, it becomeas a point of pride in what regional culture and artisanal craft can do at the highest level.
Sagada Cellar Door shows that a local story told with enough care and conviction can be premium and internationally resonant without losing its sense of self.
