Anchor & Hops, Stockton Heath
local independent business • bottle shop & tap room • brand storytelling • bespoke mural • hand painted
Anchor & Hops is one of my favourite local places to go for great quality craft ales. Located in the heart of Stockton Heath’s village centre, it’s a great alternative addition to a already vibrant scene.
Owner Chris knew he wanted something bright and eye catching that would grab passers by from the street, and let people know there was additional seating upstairs, but other than that he gave me complete freedom to come up with my own design based on my own experience of the bar.
One of the first things I notice when entering A&H are the fridges full of beer! Can art has become such a brilliant canvas for artists and illustrators in recent years, and as a result, the fridges in A&H are full of colour and drawings. The can art featured by the breweries Track, Cloudwater, Pomona and Deya were of particular inspiration to my final design.
The final design hinges around the images evoked by the word ‘anchor’, and the physical limits of the space itself. The visual narrative begins at the top of the stairs, where a Kraken attacks a cargo ship carrying beer from around the world. Directly below, a great white shark gets a taste for the intoxicating brew. As the beer cans bob down the stairs, lobsters help the S.S Anchor & Hops and slot them into the lobster cage. A hermit crab finds a new home, and an anonymous diver searches the depths of the ocean at the bottom of the stairs.
The design is entirely hand drawn and hand painted, and the composition encourages people to follow the story up the stairs, to the additional seating where they can enjoy a drink as a larger group.
