Her experience as US Creative Director for Nike Brand Design provided the necessary skills to work with national companies to create comprehensive branding strategies and design.

Valerie Taylor-Smith began her 22-year design career at Nike and worked there for 10 years before deciding to open her own studio, Design Smith.  Her experience as US Creative Director for Nike Brand Design provided the necessary skills to work with national companies to create comprehensive branding strategies and design.  Identity design, coroporate communications, packaging, retail and environmental design, web presence–all are critical to creating strong brand power.

“Urlari presented an opportunity to develop an international story for wonderful product and the people behind it.  It’s a designer’s dream to get to create an identity and packaging for a winery in Italy, let alone have clients who are smart, innovative and gracious.  The packaging was inspired by an old Etruscan coin that Roberto had found on the land.  In our research, we found that many of the ancient coins were crafted with symbolic animal figures that were indigenous to the land.  The design style was inspired by the Etruscan elongated art and their reverence for the spiritual power of animals. In ancient Etruscan civilization, it was believed that the changing moon reflects the cycles of nature; it’s light influencing all growing things–plants, animals, and humans alike—for better and for worse.  Like the moon itself, what is empty will, in time, become full again if we are patient.

This universal, romantic truth struck a chord with Roberto and Mary Kate and has been become an integral part of the brand story.  We wanted the packaging to appeal to the US market while holding on to the beautiful appeal of traditional wine labels from Europe. The result is a unique blending of the 2 ideals—simple and elegant, yet eye-catching.”