The Politics of Names

“I am from there. I am from here.
I am not there and I am not here.
I have two names, which meet and part,
and I have two languages.
I forget which of them I dream in.” 
- Mahmoud Darwish

Spirited Away

Nomenclature is a tricky thing. The name lies at the beginning of all deeds and at the end of memory. It is sometimes the burden of infamy or the herald of conquest. Wars have been fought over names. Names are often mired in the quicksand of a person’s identity, or a person’s politics.

In Miyazaki’s Spirited Away, the witch Yubaba enslaves her servants at the bathhouse by stealing their names, and consequently giving them a new name. The simple act of renaming someone in a fantastical universe becomes a metaphor for bondage. Thus, the protagonist’s journey to gain freedom from the spirit world and release her parents from a spell that turned them into pigs, is connected closely with the theft of her name. It is her very identity – the one thing that Yubaba the witch cannot truly take away from her. The name is associated with memory, belief, nostalgia, conviction, and holding on to a different and more familiar reality.

Shark Tooth - Leading the pack

Diageo's recruiter brand, Shark Tooth which is positioned in the prestige vodka segment
has seen several upheavals in its marketing mix since inception. Recently the brand went for a
complete overhaul with its structure and graphics design.

Shark Tooth intending to carve itself a more definitive space in the prestige white spirits
market. The challenge for DYW was to reposition the brand for the whisky drinkers who were
looking for a change. The consumer currently sees the prestige vodka brands asinterchangeable commodity-like offering.
The goal was to double both the adopters and adorer bases.

Task at hand for DYW was to create a sense of stature, a story,
a myth to belong to by giving the current structure (form and substrate) a fresh look.
Taking inspiration from the confidence and boldness of the consumer and contrasting it to
the sharp taste in the smooth liquid, we created a silhouette to bring out the features
along with the angular broad shoulders to add to the masculinity and elegance of the bottle
structure.

In order to bring alive the 'shark' in the Shark Tooth, its ability to camouflage itself seamlessly in its environment and depicting the shark's most visible and attitude-evoking body part we defined the shark fin as an element in the bottle structure.

Thereby, creating a perfect cut across to bring out the force as well as optimized label space.

Contact:+91 -022-40406767
Website: www.dmayellowworks.com