The Story of Hard Coraline – Apple Craft Beer Candle Label

What’s in a name?

A living doll transformation for our Apple Crisp Prohibition Beer Candle

At our official product launch party for our amazing craft beer candles, I was asked multiple times how I came up with the artwork for our Hard Coraline Apple Crisp Prohibition beer candle. To tell the truth, we hadn’t intended on scent-matching an Apple beer for our Barley & Hops Craft Candles line. But as we all know, some of the best ideas happen with no planning at all!

This is how our Apple beer candle came to be!

Sniff-n-Tell: The Neighborhood Sniff Tests

If you live in the Kansas City area, you have probably heard of 5B&Co. Candlemakers located in Weston, MO and Brookside, MO. For those people, I am not at all concerned that they won’t be interested in our craft beer candles because they KNOW the quality of candle that Marsha Flowers can produce. I am more concerned about the rest of the world. For those people, the best thing we can do is gather reviews and testimonials. One of our methods for gathering testimonials is to share our craft beer candles with our friends and their friends to sample, and then review.

One of those people was my new neighbor, Rebecca. I sent her a text, asking her if she would mind testing a few of our beer candles. She said yes, but requested an Apple Cider Brew candle scent. Since we didn’t have one, I offered her our Razzperry Tart IPA and Horney Honey Ale because they are the sweetest candles we have. She gladly accepted but almost immediately, I wanted to make her an Apple Cider Brew candle!

Hard Coraline: A Living Doll

The Inspiration for our Apple Beer Candle

It came to me quicker than green grass through a goose. Rebecca’s little daughter, Coraline. This little girl is the closest thing I have ever seen to a living doll…even her voice sounded like it came from a pull-string! It was destined to be so. Rebecca wanted an Apple Cider beer candle and she just happened to have a daughter named Coraline. So are you on my frequency now? Surfing on my good vibrations?

Hard Core Apple = Hard Coraline Apple Crisp Prohibition Beer Candle

I know, right? Brilliant!

Transforming Coraline

The first step was to get a picture of little Coraline with an apple in her mouth, as this is how I saw it. Coraline was more than happy to play along. A few minutes later, I had my picture! The next step was to transform Coraline into a living doll. My daughter is a HUGE fan of Coraline, the movie. If you haven’t seen it, I highly suggest you do. Yes, it is creepy but the 3D stop-motion animation is amazing.

The New York Times says,

“Coraline” lingers in an atmosphere that is creepy, wonderfully strange and full of feeling.

Coraline is somehow stuck between 2 realms. One is Coraline’s reality, the other some creepy existence that seems to mimic her real life but where everyone has button eyes. Creepy, right?  I could go on, but if you like Tim Burton and creepy stuff, I wouldn’t want to ruin it for you.

So herein lies the inspiration. Rebecca’s Coraline somehow reminds me of Burton’s Coraline, but not as creepy. Rebecca did tell me about how Coraline will sometimes sneak out of bed late at night and stand eerily in their doorway until she is discovered.

It was time to turn sweet little Coraline into a creepy dollie. Oh the fun I have! You can see the transformation below.