Vintage styles add a warm, authentic touch to logos and labels. Create a Jack Daniel's whiskey label logo, with old-style typography and woodcut details.
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Vintage-inspired styles add a warm, authentic touch to logo and label designs. It’s an especially popular trend amongst drinks brands, which tap into antique styles to reinforce the sense of history and tradition associated with their products.
Would you like to create a Jack Daniel's whiskey label logo? In this tutorial, we’ll create a logo inspired by the Jack Daniel's whiskey label, complete with old-style typography and woodcut details. It'll look like a printable Jack Daniel's logo template.
To maintain a high level of control over the typography, we’ll set up the layout in Adobe InDesign, before converting it to vector format in Illustrator.
As well as access to Adobe InDesign and Adobe Illustrator, you’ll also need to download the following image files:
We’ll also be using the following fonts to create the vintage design. Make sure you have these downloaded and installed:
For ease of purpose here, however, if you match the page size settings described below, you can follow my font sizing exactly.
Open up InDesign and head up to File > New > Document.
Deselect Facing Pages and set the page to a custom size of Width 16 in and Height 16 in. No need to worry about Margins or a Bleed for our purposes here, so go ahead and click OK.
With the rulers visible (View > Show Rulers), drag a guide down from the top ruler, dropping it at Y position 8 in, marking the center point of the page.
Drag a second guide out from the left-hand ruler to 8 in too.
Select the Ellipse Tool (L) and drag roughly onto the center of the page, creating an oval shape.
Switch to the Type on a Path Tool (Shift-T) and click once on the top-left corner of the oval to transform it into a text path.
Type in the title of your whiskey, here ‘Casey Joe’, in uppercase letters.
Highlight the text with your Type Tool cursor and, from either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character), set the Font to Bohem Press Regular and the Font Size to 124 pt.
We want the text to be nice and compact, and we can edit the kerning settings (which dictate the gap space between individual characters) to do so. Place your cursor between some of the individual letters which have overly generous gaps between them. Reduce the Kerning until the title appears more pulled together.
Minimize your InDesign document for just a moment, and open the vector border set you downloaded earlier in Adobe Illustrator.
Scroll down the artboard until you find the pair of border elements pictured here.Right-Click > Ungroup the pair of borders. Then drag your mouse across the elements that make up the top border and Right-Click > Group. Then head up to Edit > Copy.
Return to your InDesign document and Edit > Paste the border element onto the page. Expand the Stroke panel (Window > Stroke) and, with the border selected, increase the Weight of the stroke to 0.25 mm, to make the design a little bolder.
Open the vector ribbon set in Illustrator. Right-Click > Ungroup the vector elements on the artboard, and delete the text from the center of the border sitting to the center-right of the page.
Then select the graphic elements making up this border and Right-Click > Group. Then Edit > Copy the border.
Back in InDesign, Edit > Paste the border onto the page. From the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches), adjust the Fill Color to [Black]. Hold Shift while you resize the border, positioning it just slightly lower than the center-point of the page.
From the Stroke panel, set the weight to 0.25 pt.
Take the Type Tool (T) and drag onto the page, creating a text frame inside the top part of the ornate border. Type in ‘OUR’ and set the Font to Engravers LT Std Bold Face, Size 32 pt and decrease the Tracking (space between all the characters) to -20.
From the Paragraph panel (Window > Type & Tables > Paragraph), set the text to Align Center.
Adjust the text to read ‘BLEND’ and decrease the Font Size to 26 pt. Increase the Tracking to 80.
Create another text frame between the ‘OUR’ and ‘BLEND’ frames, typing in ‘NO. 4’. Set the Font to Portico, choosing Diablo for the weight, and the Font Size to 44 pt.
Fill in the gap above the ornate border with another text frame, listing a year and setting the Font to Engravers LT Std Bold Face, Size 50 pt, Tracking -60.
Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste the text frame, moving the copy to the top-left corner of the year. Edit the text to read ‘EST.’ and edit the Font Size to 21 pt and Tracking to -20.
Create a new text frame below the border, typing in ‘AUTHENTIC’ and setting the Font to Abril Fatface, Size 45 pt, Tracking 60. Make sure the text is set to Align Center too.
Copy and Paste the text frame, moving it below the original with a gap in-between. Edit the text to ‘WHISKEY’ and increase the Font Size to 54 pt and Tracking to 120.
Create a new text frame between ‘AUTHENTIC’ and ‘WHISKEY’ and write ‘LOUISIANA’. Set the Font to Mr. Darcy Regular, Size 33 pt, Tracking 80 and text to Align Center.
Head back to the vector ribbons set in Illustrator, and scroll down to the bottom-right corner of the artboard and the simple border sitting there. Ungroup the elements and then select the central curved line at the bottom of the border, and Edit > Copy.
Back in your InDesign document, Edit > Paste to drop the line onto the page. Adjust the Color to [Black] and rescale and position it to the left side of ‘LOUISIANA’. Increase the Weight of the Stroke to 0.15 mm.
Copy and Paste the line, and Right-Click > Flip Horizontal, moving the copy over to a mirrored position to the right side of ‘LOUISIANA’.
Scroll up to the top of your label design and select the border element at the top, and then Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste. Select the copy and Right-Click > Transform > Flip Vertical.
Move this down to the bottom of the layout, sitting it centrally underneath the ‘WHISKEY’ text frame.
The custom Jack Daniel's label has really taken shape—great job! Looking at the layout as a whole, it’s looking a little stretched out, so we can make the label appear a bit squarer by adding more text strategically.
Take the Type Tool (T) and create a small text frame to the left of the central ornate border. Type in ‘bottled and distilled by’ in uppercase letters, splitting the line after ‘bottled’. Set the text to Align Center, Font to Mr. Darcy, Size 18 pt and Tracking to 40.
Then highlight ‘AND’ and ‘BY’ individually and reduce the Font Size to 14 pt.
Select the text frame and Copy and Paste it, moving the copy over to the right side of the label, using the guide to align it with the original text frame.
Here you can type in the name of the distillery and the location.To add a trademark symbol to the distillery name, go to Window > Type & Tables > Glyphs and double-click on the appropriate symbol in the panel to insert it into the text frame.
Now all that’s left to do is to convert it to vector format, so it can be used as a scaleable logo design. Read on to find out how.
Make sure to File > Save your InDesign artwork, and then drag your mouse across all the elements sitting on the page and Edit > Copy.
Go to Illustrator and head up to File > New. Set the Width and Height to 16 in to create a square canvas to match the size of your InDesign document. Click OK.
Edit > Paste to drop the label design onto your Illustrator artboard. Center it on the page again if necessary.
Select individual parts of the label design which seem to now be merged together and Right-Click > Release Clipping Mask, until everything is separated.
You will need to outline the text on the design to make it scaleable. To do that, select individual text elements and go to Type > Create Outlines.
Expand the Layers panel (Window > Layers) and click on the Create New Layer button at the bottom of the panel. Drag this layer to sit below the label artwork layer and rename it Background.
With the label layer locked, use the Rectangle Tool (M) to create a square across the whole artboard. Set the Fill to Black.
Lock the Background layer and switch off the visibility for now. Unlock the label layer above. Select the border elements on your layout and adjust their Fill and Stroke color to White.
Then select all the outlined text elements and switch their Fill color to White too.
Now you have a Jack Daniel's whiskey logo! As a final step, switch back on the visibility of the Background layer and then select all the label artwork and Right-Click > Group.
And there we have it! A custom Jack Daniel's label design, vectorized and ready to use. It could be part of a bottle design, poster, or why not a t-shirt design? You could even draw a Jack Daniel's bottle outline to present your design!
Now you know how to design a Jack Daniel's personalized label. Keep exploring design possibilities and compositions. Create a custom printable Jack Daniel's logo template and label with these design assets:
Create a personalized Jack Daniel's printable logo label with this download. Customize this Adobe Illustrator file and use it for any kind of drink or spirit. You'll get a print-ready 300 DPI file with Adobe fonts, Jack Daniel's style, that you can easily edit to suit your brand.
Create a custom printable Jack Daniel's logo template with this font. Instead of looking for a Jack Daniel's font that's free, work with a quality font. This vintage font is inspired by classic alcoholic beverages. You could even draw a Jack Daniel's printable logo bottle outline to present your custom design.
Looking for a Jack Daniel's printable logo label template? Try out this vintage labels pack! Customize this template to create a personalized Jack Daniel's label. Open this Adobe Illustrator file and start experimenting with text and ornamental compositions. This is ready to print, so once you're done editing, you're ready to go!
How about creating a Jack Daniel's label for a wine brand? Check out this set of wine labels. It has the same classic feel as a Jack Daniel's label template. You'll just have to change the text to match your brand's name and taglines.
Maybe you're looking to create a custom Jack Daniel's logo template. This could apply to other kinds of businesses, like a vintage barbershop concept. With this download, you'll get a vectorized file with an editable font for you to customize. Add your brand's name and tagline to create a custom Jack Daniel's label design.
Ready to create a Jack Daniel's design for your label? Customize this template instead of looking for a Jack Daniel's font for free. This is great if you're looking for a Jack Daniel's label template. You've got everything you need to create a Jack Daniel's personalized label!
Hooray! Your Jack Daniel's custom label is finished, and it’s looking retro-tastic. A mix of typefaces, crowded typography, and woodcut-style borders all add up to a surprisingly easy-to-create label design.
Vintage-style labels and logos look best with an eclectic mix of lots of different elements with calligraphic and letterpress details. Find letterpress-style fonts on Envato Elements, and track down more vintage border vectors. Also find T-shirt mockups and bottle mockups.
Put all your Jack Daniel's design inspiration into practice. If you liked this tutorial, you might also like:
Editorial Note: This post has been updated with contributions from Janila Castañeda. Janila is a staff writer with Envato Tuts+.
