When the organisers of the St Albans Beer Festival asked us to look at the identity and promotion of the event for 2017, we knew immediately that we wanted to try something different from what had come before. The festival is held in the city every year, and is important to real ale aficionados as St Albans is also where you'll find CAMRA HQ — this is their hometown. 

Previous festivals have tended to rely heavily on Roman history. We wanted to create an identity that would link the festival to the city but avoid any references to centurions or cartoons of buxom Roman women in togas.

For inspiration we turned instead to St Albans Cathedral, referred to locally as 'The Abbey'. A Church of England Cathedral dating from Norman times, it was supposedly built upon the site of Saint Alban's martyrdom. We were very attracted to the idea of building a new church in the city, dedicated to a very different kind of worship.

We were invited to create the festival identity again in 2018, and having already worked on the Cathedral we looked to St Alban himself for inspiration.