How does beer and illustration relate for you?

The first few homebrews I handed out used up-cycled doodles and artwork that had been in sketchbooks collecting dust. Illustration is mostly about telling stories, and retro-fitting existing art on labels only pointed out the short-comings of the story-telling potential of the brews. There is journey to the processes of creating both brews and illustrations that I love. Each is about crafting a story. I put equal effort into the brewing of the beer and the naming and labeling of it, and the final idea comes from some aspect of the brew "story." For example, for the Slaughtered Hop label, I had actually eaten a freshly picked hop during brewing. I don't recommend it, but I like to taste everything that goes into the brewpot. Since it was brewed in the Autumn around harvest time, I thought a werewolf chowing down on a hop cone would make a great label. For the Undead Elixir, I had to bring a yeast "back from the dead" since its "best if used by" date was month's before. This provided an opportunity to draw zombies and skeletons, and who would pass that up? However, I wanted happy undead engaged in a rousing drinking song. I'm calling it my Monster Series, and they're sort of a parody/homage to the frightening, death-ridden artwork you see on Three Floyds' labels.

How did LaFleur Brewing Company start?

LaFleur Brewing Co. started with the silly idea that anyone could enter their homebrews into the Untappd app. The first step is coming up with a stupid brewery name. Because of my freelance work, my last name has always been my calling card, and it's fairly unique unless you live in Quebec. I know this app isn't one of your favorites, and there are many things that could be better about it, but it's pretty neat to add your beers so others can log them in and rate them. After arranging a meeting with someone who I would classify as a pro-homebrewer, minutes before the meeting, I took a sharpie and quickly drew a fleur-de-lys on a bottle cap before I gave it to him. His first response was "I like this." Boom! Impression made before the beer was even sampled.

I started putting my beers into the hands and mouths of more people, and it dawned on me that this would be the perfect vehicle to share and promote my illustration. Duh. I'm not trying to start a brewery here. But there should be artwork on the damn bottle. Who doesn't like beer? The first official labeled bottle was for a Belgian Specialty I had made, and I was meeting up with none other than Good Beer Hunting to give him a bottle. I tweeted later "I wondered if I could promo my work this way," and your response was a strong affirmation of that.

I even arranged a meeting with Cleetus Friedman after reading about his beer collaborations, met him at City Provisions, and we chatted briefly about making beer and working together at some point. Once I had his approval of the beers and labels I left for him, I realized I had to up my game.