The month of October was one of the liveliest in our history – with new product drops, label artwork, residencies, and more –  so we thought it only right to look back upon the last 30 days and fill you guys in on some of the highlights you may have missed.

In-cide(r) our new Ciders:

We kicked off the month in excitable fashion, with our brand-new cider finally hitting shelves, fridges, and taps nationwide.

And we’re pretty damn pleased with the finished results, even though we do say so ourselves. We’ve produced four distinct variations – a classic original cider, one with a dash of effervescence, and another two British berry-based brews; one made with raspberries, and another with blackcurrant.

Our staple original cider is a delicate, light, and aromatic liquid made with apples sourced directly from farmers in Kent. Based on dessert apples, this style doesn’t have the tannic finish you’d usually associate with traditional cider varieties. Instead, you have an easy drinking, thirst quenching and deliciously fresh half-sweet cider.

Its sparkling cousin, meanwhile, is a dry, lightly carbonated cider with a fresh delicate nose and a punchy flavour. The appearance is golden, cloudy and – as with everything at Umbrella – completely natural. Taste-wise, it begins with hints of stone-fruit – think apricots and plums – and finishes with a perfectly-balanced acidity.

Then we come to our two fruitier varieties. The raspberry cider is made with real fruit – no concentrates or extracts involved. It’s based on a clean apple cider, which allows the raspberry flavour to really come to the fore. The blackcurrant cider, similarly, is made simply with real fruit and absolutely no concentrates. It’s a real easy drinker and has a great balance and flavour, matching the high acidity of the blackcurrant.

All four liquids in the range recently came off the back of a month-long stint at The Sun Tavern for their much-loved Takeover Tuesday initiative – during which patrons could get their hands on some of the good stuff for just £3, and for a tenner we threw in some exclusive branded merch to boot.

If you missed out, not to worry since you’ll be able to pick up a bottle or pint of our finest at a pub, bar, or bottle shop near you. Check our stockist page for all the details you’ll ever need.

Dead Rabbits and Lively Nights:

London Cocktail Week, which took place during the first week of the month, saw us drop our brand-spanking-new label designs, made in collaboration with serial World’s Best Bar winners, The Dead Rabbit NYC.

They were unveiled during their big London taproom takeover, as they commandeered the bar at The Sun Tavern in Bethnal Green for one night only.

The Dead Rabbit have developed quite the global reputation for their award winning New York-based cocktail bar, paired with strong menu design and art direction. Depicting the Dead Rabbit himself in comic book style, the menus add another level to the patron’s journey. To celebrate working together, we created these labels inspired by their iconic graphic novel artwork.

For those of you who know their bar you will know how iconic the style is and we were really happy to feature the artwork on our Ginger Beer Bottles and collaborate on the event itself.

The night also saw a banging cocktail list (on which our ginger beer got a proud inclusion in ‘The Sham Rocker’ libation) curated by their beverage director, Jilian Vose, and live sounds from the multi-talented Arveene to dance the night away to.

Pick up one of our newly-suited bottles in a shop near you. Hurry – there’s only a limited number of these out there so you’d better be quick about it.

Umbrella Brewing Skates onto the Big Screen:

Moving on later into October, the middle of the month saw us release yet another line of brand-new label designs, this time taking inspiration from skaters and skating culture – two areas close to our hearts.

To mark the 15th anniversary of the release of Girl Skateboard’s groundbreaking skate video Yeah Right! (2003), directed by Ty Evans and Spike Jonze, we dropped a limited-edition artwork series that heavily featured the strong neon aesthetic of Girl’s brand, also taking inspiration from the iconic green ‘invisible’ skateboard that facilitated one of the coolest videos of all time.

We’re pretty pleased with the results, and this limited edition run are available from most reputable stockists while they last.

And our collaboration continued closely following this, as we sponsored the grand UK premiere of their new film Doll held in TT Liquor’s new cinema set-up, doling out bottle after bottle of our finest to see them through.

As you would expect from any Girl Films production the title sequence is brilliant and the comedy skits are as on point as ever. John Marello and Rye Beres did an incredible job making this video. Good work guys, you all killed it and we loved playing the small role we did.

So all in all, a very eventful October. Thanks to all who helped make it such a success, and keep your ears to the ground for future developments coming out of Holloway – plenty of cool things in the pipeline to look forwards to.

Watch this space.

It’s the legendary Spike Jonze’s 49^th birthday today.

To mark the occasion, and following on from our recent label art collaboration with his skate brand Girl Skateboards, we thought it only fitting to look back on some of his most enduring and memorable contributions to the world of music videography.

Young Spike started off riding and shooting skate and BMX vids with his friends around Maryland, and going on tour with skate team Blind Skateboards. Before long he’d founded his own magazine – Dirt – landed a job with Transworld Sports, and was a regular contributor to BMX mag Freestylin’, shooting and writing about the emerging street sports genres.

In a matter of months he’d moved on to the up-and-coming world of skate video-making, putting together whimsical street skateboarding videos like the ground-breaking and highly-acclaimed “Video Days” (1991). The recognition gained from this led to music videos for bands he loved, like Sonic Youth and the Breeders.

Since then he’s been involved in a number of projects, ranging from television work, to writing, acting, and Academy Award-winning film-making.

However, despite this, in his formative years he says he was always more inspired by music than by film, such as the iconic Michael Jackson music videos of the 1980s.

Speaking to The Independent this year, Jonze recalled: “It felt so natural. Filming dance was like filming skateboarding. There’s one place to put the camera to make a trick work. The camera and the skater or the dancer are collaborating and when you lock together, it’s so emotionally satisfying. I got hooked.”

And his music videos do have a certain disitinct style to them – very much centred in on the medium of dance for expression, but with a handful of playful and prankish flair thrown in for good measure.

Over the years, Jonze has had a hand in some of the most distinctive, funny, versatile, and all-round badass music videos around – working for artists ranging from Weezer to Daft Punk. If we had the time we’d talk about them all, but since that would take all year we’ve narrowed it down to just the ten.

So, without any further ado, here are our top 10 Spike Jonze music videos – as voted for by our office:

10. The Pharcyde – ‘Drop’

Spike taught the 4 MC’s of Pharcyde to rap backwards and then films them rapping in reverse while doing simple things like “stripping”. When the footage is altered and synched up it becomes one of the most compulsive music video watching experiences of all time.

9. Daft Punk – ‘Da Funk’

A talking, boombox-wielding dog wanders through the big city with a broken leg, ultimately choosing music over a possible love connection. There’s a message about the essentials of human nature in there somewhere.. we think.

8. Chemical Brothers – ‘Electrobank’

This video is impressive for a number of reasons. For one, it’s a pretty inspiring video about the lesser-known struggles of up-and-coming professional gymnasts, giving viewers a glipse into their world. It also shows just how little is needed in order for a filmmaker to adequately tell a story. Gritty backing by the Chemical Brothers compounds its atypical aura.

7. FatLip – ‘What’s Up Fat Lip?’

Released a couple of years after FatLip leaving The Pharcyde, this song, the music video – and the accompanying documentary – all converge to give us an insight into the complicated mind of a once successful musician who found himself in hard times. A heady mixture of humour, melancholy, and surrealism – one great track.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07nm2qYqb6s

6. Arcade Fire – ‘The Suburbs’

It’s easy to get sucked into the story of this video, which features some teens who appear carefree at first but must cope with the jarring realisation (for the viewer, in any case) that they live in a military state. The work was part of a wider short film, directed by Jonze, called Stories from the Suburbs. Worth a watch.

5. Weezer – ‘Buddy Holly’

Using some seriously cool camera trickery, Jonze pays homage to Happy Days with Rivers and the gang edited into some footage from Arnold’s diner. What’s even more remarkable is that the sequence was shot over the course of one day. The song makes for pretty good listening too we reckon.

4. Björk – ‘It’s Oh So Quiet’

Jonze plays to the huge changes in dynamics on this track by switching between slow motion movements and elaborate, enthusiastic dance scenes. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a visual sequence that more closely matches its musical accompaniment.

3. Fatboy Slim – ‘Praise You’

Jonze steps in front of the camera for a change to demonstrate some of his stellar dance moves. It’s impossible to watch this video without a smile on your face, and for that, we have to praise you, Spike. Added to that is the fact that it was filmed passer-by style on a mobile phone – amateur dancing, amateur videography, but the two marry together to create one wholly memorable, and eminently watchable, music video.

2. Beastie Boys – ‘Sabotage’

We’re pretty confident when we say that the Beastie Boys have NEVER made a bad music video … but ‘Sabatoge’ is probably the best of the lot. In a loving, hilarious tribute to 70’s cop-dramas they and Spike created a video that became one of the best early examples of experimental music video making.

1. Fatboy Slim – ‘Weapon Of Choice’

This one features an idea that made everyone else slap themselves on the head for not thinking of it first. Put Christopher Walken in your music video! Of course, that’s a great idea! Why did it take until the year 2000 for this to happen? Walken has always been an enigmatic character. There’s his unusual vocal delivery, and his natural ability to play both mean villains and appear in comedies. As an actor, he can do it all. But, until 2000, who knew he could dance? For half the song, Walken wows you with his moves and by the time he jumps over the railing and flies all around the hotel, it’s just pure bliss. Beyond Walken’s dancing abilities, the video is also incredibly well-made. Spike Jonze takes us all over the place and shows an incredible knack for directing dance performances. It’s thrilling to watch, and like all of his videos, it’s fun and light-hearted.

“Being familiar with the comic books, I like the taxi cab design. It’s very New York.”

Check out the link below for the write-up about our most recent label art, a product of The Umbrella Project’s The Sun Tavern’s collaboration with Dead Rabbit NYC, inspired by the famous bar’s iconic artwork.

Click here for the write-up with lookbook.

“The labels were launched at Carnival East – a reggae infused night on the weekend of Notting Hill carnival.”

Our latest bottle art takes inspiration from The Slicker’s hit ‘Johnny Too Bad’, which also happens to be Matt the head brewer’s favourite song.

Get ‘em while they’re cold rude boy!

Click here for our full write-up and lookbook.

We’re happy to announce that Kicking Horse are now distributing Umbrella Brewing Ginger Beer to restaurants, bars and bottleshops across London, Brighton, Bristol and Birmingham.

Check out their website at: www.kicking-horse.co.uk

Every month we invite staff from five bars to join us at our Holloway Brewery to see how we make our ginger beer – we’ll chuck in some BBQ food, cocktails and of course some ginger beer as a bonus!

We restored and converted the brewery ourselves – it was a fire-damaged wreck when we got our hands on it. Our head brewer Matt Armitage will tell our story whilst showing the groups around the Victorian industrial building where we produce the ginger beer. Matt will explain how the liquid is made, and give a run through of each step of the brewing process and how we get the most out of the natural ingredients – he’ll also teach the bartenders to make some bespoke ginger beer based cocktails, so that they can be served in the bars.

We’ll then rustle up some BBQ food in our yard, enjoy some sunshine (hopefully!) and chat about our ginger beer.

If you stock our ginger beer and are interested in coming to meet us and having a look around, give us a call on 020 3211 0004 or fill out the enquiry form on our contact page. We host the events on the last Tuesday of every month.

Umbrella Brewing worked with Dewar’s on an experimental whisky-finished batch of Alcoholic Ginger Beer.

Dewar’s kindly gave us one of their Aberfeldy whisky casks (no. 4521) which we used to mature a batch of our Ginger Beer. We’re very happy with the results – the time in the oak barrel has mellowed the flavour of the liquid, and it has picked up a nuance of the whisky on the finish.

With Tales Of The Cocktail crossing the pond, touching down in Edinburgh this April, we thought there no better place to head to launch our ‘Experiment’. Tales Of The Cocktail have been touring The Americas from their base in New Orleans for the last six years, shedding light on the cocktail culture as far and wide as Vancouver, Buenos Aires, and Mexico City.

We started by heading to see our pal, Rebekah Dooley and friends at The Dead Rabbit’s pop-ups, where we supped a glass or two – top notch!

Andy snuck down Advocate’s Close to Devil’s Advocate. We wandered down to Bramble and The Bon Vivant too, more of Edinburgh’s best cocktail bars, dropping off our wares as we went – a thank you for their help with us throughout our stay. All were reeling off the superlatives – music to our ears, and a great start!

In the little down time we had, Edinburgh’s finest Whisky stores were taken in, and up and down the steep inclines, we showed our latest brew the sights.

Then to the grand finale – The Dewar’s Dinner, held at the “game changing” Timberyard, and hosted by Jamie Mac – Bacardi’s European Whisky Ambassador. Ryan Chetiyawardana of White Lyan and Dandelyan, supplied some stunning concoctions to set the mood.

Before dessert, Matt, our Master Brewer, gave a little introduction to our ‘Experiment’, letting all the folks know how he created the Ginger Beer.

This just made our thirst grow, as everyone had a whisky-finished ginger beer in front of them, almost toying with us all! Once opened, they went down a storm. Dinner wasn’t bad either! The rest of the night’s pretty hazy, but it’s safe to say the Whisky-Finished Ginger Beer hit the spot.

Tìoraidh Edinburgh!

The boys at Discount Suit Company have got in on the act and made their own Umbrella Brewing Ginger Beer cocktail – The Natural Bán Killer!

Natural Bán Killer

Bán Poitin, Orgeat, Apple, Lemon, Topped with Umbrella Brewing Ginger Beer 

Our mates down at The Sun Tavern in Bethnal Green have been getting creative with Umbrella Brewing Ginger Beer and have made some quality new cocktails with it!

Stop by and check out The Cure and Apollo!

The Cure

Tullamore, Sloe gin, Lemon, Sloe berry bitters, Smoked bitters & topped with Umbrella Brewing Ginger Beer

Apollo

We’re happy to announce The Real Al Company is now distributing Umbrella Brewing Ginger Beer throughout London!

Check out their website at: therealalcompany.co.uk

A test run of our first batch of Ginger Beer with our new labels UB3 – UB7, for trial at our sister bars Discount Suit Company and The Sun Tavern.