Hugmun’s calligraphic identity for EnKo Beauty reflects the artistry of founder Caylin McDonie

Founded and launched by makeup artist Caylin McDonie, having garnered great acclaim and notoriety on social media for her challenging, forward-thinking creations, EnKo Beauty is a cosmetics brand determined to blend a sustainable, anti-waste, consumer-conscious practice with revered modern beauty standards. Turning to design studio Hugmun, the Copenhagen-based creatives translated the artistry of McDonie’s work into an ethereal, textured, calligraphic visual language – resulting in a unique, semi-surreal brand that typographically matches her avant-garde outputs.

The typographic trio laying the brand’s foundations is led by Hugman’s own Rabbit Hole, a fluid, organic display typeface that mirrors the eccentric flourishes of McDonie’s makeup artistry. “Rabbit Hole was created because of the Enko project,” Project Manager Harriet Elsom tells us, recalling the initial creation of EnKo’s four letters by Hugman’s Co-founder Tomasz Pawluk. “It inspired him to create the whole font,” Elsom continues, using the expanded alphabet set across the brand’s packaging, “although the four custom letters from the logotype are unique and you will not find them in the Rabbit Hole font,” she caveats.

Supporting Rabbit Hole is Boulevard LAB’s Sometimes Times, providing a powerful contrast in weight to the former’s bold construction. “The combination of Sometimes Times elegant letters and the curls and swirls of Rabbit Hole gives a bit of a baroque feeling,” Elsom suggests, looking to subvert the usual widely-spaced lettering of beauty typography by tightly kerning the headlines. “It is aligned with the art by McDonie,” she continues, “who breaks the rules of ‘everyday’ makeup with avant-garde ideas,” playing a conceptual role and functionally giving the packaging more space for longer product names. A similar sense of practicality and character is also mirrored in the use of Plain by Optimo, the sans serif design of which again contrasts with the stature of Rabbit Hole whilst not competing with Sometimes Times’ angular forms.

EnKo’s brand experience comes to life in the tangibility of its packaging design, created in collaboration with MARCELI printery, with Fedrigoni’s Carte à Parfum paper blind debossed alongside letterpressed typography. “Together with Marcin Dudziak, we tested a few papers,” Elsom recalls, “and Cart à Parfum had the best qualities for tactile finishing with debossing” – a set of delicate features championed through the brand’s monochromatic aesthetic. “Enko has a whole range of colourful eyeshadows and highlighters,” Elsom concludes, “so the stripped-back white packaging is to give more focus on the products that are inside,” keeping a strong consistency across the beauty range and allowing the eclectic collection of type and 3D forms to express themselves fully.

Hugmun

EnKo Beauty