In their own words
Stripping it down, I landed on using very extended custom type shaped horizontal, roughly like a cigarette.
It’s important to be aware of what’s going on in whatever industry you’re designing for, but it’s also important to be able to ignore it a little bit.
A lot of my work revolves around embracing imperfections.
Mina isn’t the kind of restaurant you have to wear your fanciest shirt to.
The style of the illustrations would be key, not the actual illustration itself.
Stripping the visual languages I create down to the basics has been part of evolving my practice, which hasn’t been easy for someone big on ‘out there’ stuff.
The identity should feel like a homage to restaurant culture; we all felt like that just summarised everything perfectly.
This typeface was exactly what we needed and perfectly fit into everything else.
Articles & interviews
- Davy Denduyver gives Amsterdam’s Nikotin a raw, ink-drawn identity
Bruges-based designer Davy Denduyver created a raw, ink-drawn identity for Nikotin, a new restobar in Amsterdam Noord founded by Nachbar and chef Tim Van Der Molen. The branding uses hand-drawn typography, a restrained color palette of orange, black, and white, and analogue techniques to reflect the venue’s balance between refined dining and nightlife energy. The result captures Nikotin’s hybrid character through tactile imperfection and bold simplicity.
- Review of the Year 2025: Top 25 Graphic Design
It’s Nice That’s annual ‘Review of the Year 2025: Top 25 Graphic Design’ highlights the most-read and influential design stories of the year. The roundup spans topics from the resurgence of Gothic aesthetics and humor in design culture to the global reach of K-pop visuals and food-related branding projects. It reflects a year of curiosity, experimentation, and cultural crossover in graphic design.
- Davy Denduyver Brands Restaurant with 100+ Charcoal Food Drawings
The article profiles Davy Denduyver’s branding for Mina, a new restaurant and wine bar in Barcelona. The identity features over 100 charcoal illustrations that capture the restaurant’s relaxed and intimate atmosphere. Denduyver collaborated with intern Lisa Van Landschoot to create a tactile, imperfect visual system inspired by Italian culture and old film posters.
- Davy Denduyver creates vivid identity for Saigon's Elgin
The Brand Identity features Bruges-based designer Davy Denduyver’s vivid and type-driven identity for Elgin, a restaurant in Saigon. Drawing inspiration from restaurant receipts and thermal printing, the branding combines stretched typography, handwritten wordmarks, and playful contrasts to reflect the restaurant’s story and culture. The project uses Therma and Basier Circle typefaces and balances minimalism with expressive visual energy.
- Put that on a T-shirt: 8 identities that look stellar when they’re worn, from Forth + Back and more
The article by Poppy Thaxter spotlights eight design studios whose brand identities translate beautifully onto apparel, particularly T-shirts. It highlights how wearable branding extends a brand’s presence into the physical world, featuring projects from studios like Forth + Back, Davy Denduyver, and Foreign Policy. The roundup celebrates creativity in merging fashion and identity design.