COOOT treats PocketTAILS cocktails as books in a flavour archive

The Brand Identity: PocketTAILS turns the cocktail into a book. Each 100ml serving lives inside a compact, rectangular box with a colour-coded spine and cover dedicated to a single bold silhouette. “The concept came from a simple thought: what if you could open a cocktail anytime, anywhere?” explains Bai Mi, Creative Director of COOOT Studio.

The self-initiated packaging project treats classics – including Paloma, Cosmopolitan, Old Fashioned, Brandy Sour, Margarita, Piña Colada, Dirty Martini and Corpse Reviver – as entries in what the Zhengzhou-based studio calls a flavour archive. On the cover of each box, a single cocktail-glass silhouette fills the composition. The coupe belongs to the Brandy Sour, the tall stemmed silhouette to the Paloma, the inverted triangle to the Cosmopolitan. Each functions as an icon, label and flavour cue simultaneously. Mi describes the drafting as an exercise in restraint. “The balance was between recognisability and graphic clarity,” he says.

“Accuracy was important, but only to the extent that the silhouette remained immediately identifiable. The final shapes are simplified, but still faithful to the original forms.” Inside each glass shape, the cocktail’s name breaks across multiple lines to fit the silhouette – PAL / OM / A on Paloma, COSMO / POLI / TAN on Cosmopolitan – followed by the provenance, volume and ABV in smaller type beneath. The effect is closer to a film poster than a drinks label. Colours are pulled directly from the drinks. The Blue Margarita gives up its blue; Brandy Sour contributes olive; Cosmopolitan supplies dusty pink; Piña Colada offers warm terracotta.

“When building the system, we wanted each variant to stand out individually while remaining balanced as a group,” Mi notes. “The combinations were carefully adjusted so the series feels cohesive rather than random.” Seen together, the boxes read like a paperback spine lineup on a shelf; viewed individually, each cover holds enough weight to stand on its own. For the wordmark, Pocket is set in lowercase Helvetica Neue Bold Extended, which reads as rational and solid; TAILS runs in uppercase alongside it, joined without a space, shifting the voice in the middle of a single word.

Albertus Nova is used for body type across the wider system, its sharper, more classical character sitting against the Helvetica. “The contrast between these two typefaces creates energy within the system,” Mi shares. “In layouts, I prefer using size differences to build hierarchy, keeping the visual language unified while still maintaining tension.” Alongside the cocktail name and volume, ‘Mixed in Mexico’ appears on the Paloma box and ‘Mixed in Italy’ on most of the others. Mi describes the decision as both editorial and practical. “On the product level, highlighting the origin respects the identity of each cocktail,” he explains.

“On the design level, this factual information was translated into visible elements on the packaging, helping consumers understand and remember each variant.” Beyond the individual boxes, the system extends into a curated collection box – eight classics bundled into a single sleeve marked ‘8 Classics / Curated Cocktail Collection’ – and into merchandise, including a pale yellow tote carrying an oversized burgundy martini silhouette. At every scale, the glass does the identifying; the typography, colour and provenance fill in the rest. The shape of the packaging came out of an image: shelves of different flavours, assembled and collected.

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The article discusses an innovative packaging strategy that could influence brand perception in the beverage industry, making it significant for brand professionals while presenting a moderately new approach to design.