Duvel-SUYT Art Glass Design Competition: Chicago Winner

In a special collaboration between Duvel USA and ShowUsYourType — a kulturspace production — graphic designers and artists worldwide are invited to submit designs depicting the name of a selected city using easily identifiable local iconography and graphic elements. The winning designs will be featured on Duvel’s iconic tulip glass as well as a series of promotional premium items such as posters, t-shirts, and coasters.

The second leg of this competition, which ran from February 15 to March 15, inspired a collection of colorful Chicago illustrations ranging from retro to symbolic, expressive to nostalgic. After careful deliberation and review, Duvel USA has selected Anna Tóth’s elegant depiction of the bubbles of Duvel’s effervescence with a nod to the Chicago theater’s iconic LED circles as the winning design.

The Winning Design: The Art of Effervescence

"We have gone for design and elegance over direct “Chicago” references with our choice for the winning design. This submission is unique in the way the bubble motif reflects Duvel’s position as the most effervescent beer in the world, with a high design aesthetic which we believe matches Chicago’s reputation as one of the world’s leading cities for art." — Stuart Knight, Director of Import Marketing, Duvel USA

The Design Inspiration

Anna Tóth attributes the inspiration for her artwork to a short performance she did as a teenager, inspired by a Chicago musical. She remembers it as a fun-filled project with lots of laughs and giggles, despite treating it as a somewhat serious task at the time. Anna owns a couple of the Duvel glasses which feature an engraved ‘D’ at the base of the glass — the launch base of a bubble tornado, and a detail that never fails to fascinate her. Using the mesmerizing bubble motif, Anna’s design is a fun and dreamy interplay of the Chicago theater’s iconic LED circles with the geometry of Duvel’s floating bubbles.

About the Designer

Originally an electrical engineer specializing in robotics and self-driving vehicles, Anna Tóth is essentially a creator constantly on the lookout for interdisciplinary challenges and continuous learning. With much of her professional career revolving around transitions, she has recently progressed into design and computational creativity, and is currently setting up a microbusiness offering graphic design and web solutions.

Keen to explore projects where clients have a need for her mixed engineering and design background, Anna is currently focused on honing her artistic self-expression and has been developing her knowledge and techniques in graphic design, illustration and animation basics. @illustratoth

Paying It Forward

In addition to receiving a pack of Duvel promotional premium items featuring her design, Anna also gets to direct a $500 donation to a Chicago charity of her choice, made in her name via the kulturspace Foundation.

She has chosen to benefit The Chicago Lighthouse: a world-renowned social service organization serving the blind, visually impaired, disabled, and Veteran communities. Passionate about inclusion and accessibility, Anna feels that services such as vision rehabilitation and innovative assistive technologies provided by The Chicago Lighthouse are vital towards making art and design universally perceivable.

Thank You for Sharing Your Work with Us

A hearty congratulations to Anna Tóth on her illusory portrayal capturing the best of Duvel and Chicago, and a huge thank you to all the designers and artists who shared their brilliant interpretations of Chi City with us. It was a wonderful experience visiting Chicago through your colorful depictions. Keep inspiring us with your work; it matters.

A Collaboration of Synergy

Duvel is far more than just a passion for beer. It is a real passion for good taste. Renowned as a strong Belgian golden ale, brewed in Belgium and exported to more than forty countries, Duvel has always had a special affinity for contemporary art, design, and architecture. This is clearly evident from their active collaboration with international artists for the Duvel Collection, as well as the different art initiatives they support.

ShowUsYourType — a project that combines typography, travel, and cities — started as a creative platform for designers to share their talents and explore cities from a different perspective. It has since grown into an international community with a devoted audience of over 67,000 followers on Instagram.

Always on the lookout for synergistic collaborations that benefit the creative community, kulturspace — an LA & Berlin-based creative think tank + design and production collective — was only too happy to orchestrate and produce this stimulating series of competitions. Driven by its collaborative and organic DNA, kulturspace has spearheaded and produced a number of cultural and creative projects including the LA Fashion Film Festival, the Berlin Student Film Festival, Behance Adobe Portfolio Reviews, ShowUsYourType LA & Berlin, and the U-Bahn Berlin book, to name a few.