Raw Milk Antiques & Retreat

Hand Selected Antiques in Richmond, Virginia and Online
Curated Cuisine and Retreats in Destinations around the World

Bespoke retreats and unique antiques with custom plant illustrations over an old building's entryway
Raw Milk Retreats and Antiques logo with an illustration of a pitcher with flowers over a forest

We helped Raw Milk Retreats with:

  • Content & Social Media Strategy

  • Logo & Brand Design

  • Squarespace Website Design and Build

 

How It Started…

Sariann, owner of Raw Milk Retreats, came to us wanting some help with overall brand structure, strategy and visual branding. She had a retreat brand (Raw Milk Retreats) and a totally separate antiques brand, but wanted to bring the antiques brand under the Raw Milk umbrella. The VVITCHes were tasked with creating a visual brand that could essentially serve as two separate brands when needed.

Our team started out deep diving into Sariann’s various audiences so that we could understand who we were creating this brand for. After audience research, SEO keyword research, hashtag research and setting up a content creation system, Sariann was in a good place with her content and social media strategy.

Time for a Rebrand

Now that the team had a clear idea of the people that Sariann serves, it was time to create a visual brand identity that aligned better with that brand vision.

We asked Sariann who her brand would be if it was a person. Her response? “Abigail Fix from Around the World in 80 Days - looks like she's always prepared for any eventuality, in a kickass victorian lady way” among other super descriptive and specific people. We love when our clients have a clear vision of their brand. This insight, along with the other information we collected from Sariann gave our brand designer a clear path forward.

The result is a playful, whimsical brand that conveys warmth and creativity. The illustrations are custom and elevate the overall bespoke feeling. Tying all of these visual elements together is what truly separates a strong, intentional brand and a brand that is just trying to look good.

 
 
A blue Raw Milk logo with an illustration of a vintage pitcher with flowers in a gold oval frame
Sample thank you stationery branded for Raw Milk Retreats and Antiques leaning against a white wall
A dark blue business card with the Raw Milk logo designed by VVITCH Digital sitting on white dish
A version of the Raw Milk logo in a circle in four different color variations by VVITCH Digital VA
A product tag branded with custom illustrations and the Raw Milk circle logo designed by VVITCH Digital
A custom illustration of a bouquet in a vintage pitcher in four different color variations
The Raw Milk logo with blue text and the bouquet illustration over an image of stationery by VVITCH Digital
 

 An Elegant Suite of Illustrations…

For Raw Milk, our designer, Carly, brainstormed all things antique and bespoke travel. She wanted to incorporate both sides of the business. In searching through some of Sariann’s antiques photos, she found an image of a pitcher with just the right amount of detail on it - meaning it wouldn’t look like a scribbled mess when scaled down, but would still appear visually interesting at a larger size. Carly also sought inspiration through Sariann’s travel images, and found that much of the imagery was full of florals & plant life - which gave her the idea to fill the drawing of the pitcher with flowers.

 
A custom illustration of line drawn flowers in orange designed by VVITCH Digital Agency Virginia
A line drawn pitcher with floral decoration in blue designed by VVITCH Digital Agency Charlottesville
 

…Meant to provide as many design options as possible.

Working through the illustration, Carly tried out including different levels of detail until she found a good middle ground. She also made sure to illustrate the pitcher and the florals separately, so that they could be used independently for each sub-brand when needed.

Once the illustration was done, she brought the base of the logo into Procreate so that she could sketch out different compositions to tie the illustration into the logo overall.

The results: stunning mix and match illustrations perfect to use on everything from hang tags to big signs.

Raw Milk Retreats on Social Media

There are a few things we know to be true on social media:

  1. you have to stand out

  2. content creation needs to be as simple as possible

  3. you need to make sure that people understand, from a quick glance at your social media content, what you do without reading much, if any, of the captions.

For Raw Milk, we achieved all of this by making visually striking social media templates that are formatted for Feeds, Stories and Pinterest. We always want to make content creation seamless and as plug-and-play as it can be. Armed with that knowledge, we made templates for a variety of content needs — featuring a retreat, highlighting a new product, sharing a quote. All of these types of content were considered in these flexible, custom Canva social media templates.

 
A retreat highlight social media post sample displayed on a phone held by a hand before a marble table
What to expect on a retreat social media post for Raw Milk featuring an image of a destination
An antique product social media post featuring an image of a mug with a gold monogram and the price
A social media post calling for questions about a Scottish retreat featuring an image of Scotland
A social media template branded for Raw Milk designed to feature a title and text about a retreat
A social media template for a Wine and Cheese Retreat branded for Raw Milk featuring a dining table
A social media template featuring fly fishing for a retreat in Scotland and an image of the location

Semi-Custom Squarespace Website Design & Build

Next up, Sariann and team decided to update the design of the Raw Milk website to better reflect their new brand identity. We designed a refreshed site utilizing the Olivia theme by Squaremuse that fits the Raw Milk aesthetic perfectly.

 Want to see more of our work?