As part of Hennessy cognac's "artist series" of custom designed bottles, LAUNDRY! Co-Founder/Creative Director P.J. Richardson teamed with popular LA-based DJ Steve Aoki to design a one-of-kind bottle for the French distillery. Other bottle collaborations in the series include the musician Kid Sister and artist Fafi, Q-Tip and Spaceknuckle and The Roots' Questlove and Aerosyn-Lex.
Incorporating Richardson's distinct bubble art style, which can be seen in his early graffiti and skateboard art, and Aoki's own visual sense, their Hennessy bottle is a classic example of the "more is more" philosophy with multiple layers and a dense animation quality that reveals intricate details the closer you look at it - much like the city they both call home.
"Steve and I both agreed that creating something crazy, graphic and visually busy would convey the energy that represented us both well, while using words woven in to the design to call out both our names and our hometown LA -- in fun ways," Richardson said. "Steve's roots are in punk and club music, mine are in graffiti and animation. For this, we didn't want to not adhere to any one visual language, but simply freestyle some drawings that we both could agree were just fun. We are both from California and there is a certain punk, free-form sensibility that we're not entirely conscious of that spilled into our bottle."
This isn't the first time Richardson has worked in the bottle format - in 2008 he created an original bottle design for Mountain Dew. And, not surprisingly, this looks to be only the beginning of the creative relationship between Richardson and Aoki. The two are set to collaborate on a music video for Aoki's new album "Earthquakey People" that will feature Rivers Cuomo of Weezer.
"There is a purity to Hennessy and to match that we created a unified design that simply complimented Hennessy's brand of excellence with our own," Richardson added.