Dark Woods Coffee x Jonathan Gibbs
19 February 2025
Wood engraver Jonny Gibbs has worked with Dark Woods Coffee’s own creative team on packaging a new series of seasonal, limited edition products to help us get through the grind.
Dark Woods Coffee is an adventurous coffee roaster nestled on the edge of Marsden village in the West Yorkshire Pennines. With global producers painstakingly sourced and the roasted beans packaged by hand, they have launched the Producer Series, a concise selection of roasts aimed at the coffee geek, to accompany it’s core range which appeals to the wider coffee drinking public.
“My collaboration with Dark Woods Coffee has been a wholly inspiring experience. The work was to express the three themes for three boxes: City, Cloud, and Field. Each subject was to be composed in a frieze-like strip that would run around the box-lid, allowing space for typography and symbols.
I met with Rich Norgate and Paul Meikle-Janney to talk about what they wanted and what they liked about my work. Following this conversation I made a few pencil drawings, the stage that is always the most crucial during a commission. It all went well. Rich and Paul's feedback enabled small changes to the drawings and I was given approval to make final artwork.
I put together three sets of woodblocks, altogether fifteen separate pieces that joined together to fit the format. This was a close and happy collaboration with Rich, the designer, and I was encouraged at all points to work freely in interpreting the brief. The final result demonstrates a most creative and rewarding endeavour and it has been a great pleasure to work with Dark Woods Coffee."
More of Jonny's beautiful print making here.
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