Book Design for the third cocktail menu of The Bombay Canteen, India’s Top Café+Bar.
The third edition of the popular Canteen Cocktails by The Bombay Canteen, a café and bar that's Indian at heart, is themed around the old school single-screen cinema halls of Bombay. These iconic landmarks, once filled with glamour, melodious entertainment and whistling crowds, are now lost in by-lanes of the city, still reflecting the beautiful nostalgia off their facades. This menu+guidebook aims to capture the lost essence of these talkies, celebrating their films, songs, people and the talkie-going culture that once was.
Illustrating the Talkies of Bombay
After hopping from one talkie to another, documenting its facade, each of them were recreated on paper with sketches and paints. Hand painted illustrations trying to recapture the old school lost magic of these super popular cinema halls of old Bombay. Pencil sketches, micron inking and watercolour painted illustrations were then scanned and digitally colour corrected to black and white images to incorporate in the print design of the menu book.
Cocktail posters
Each cocktail is themed around an iconic movie that played at the talkie and the inspiration for the visual style of the cocktail posters comes from the old-school movie posters from that era. The cocktail menu pages are designed as the old movie posters, recreating the vibe for the serving.
Credits & gratitude
This project was my main internship work at Please See//, Mumbai over a period of 7 months. My contribution has been in the process of research, ideation, menu conceptualization, illustrations, poster templates as well as book layouts. The menu was launched on 25th October, 2018.
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OTHER CREDITS
This project was a collaborative outcome of the teams at The Bombay Canteen, Please See// and Bombaywalla Historic Works. Cocktails by Bartender Raul & Cocktail Images by Chef Heena. Book available on sale at The Bombay Canteen, Mumbai. Thank you, team!