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william
schweigert

wbc
whisler’s
sorry
quari ice
delani
eccl

vimeo
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practice








Whisler’s & Mezcalería Tobalá


Role & Timeline

Creative Director & Beverage Director (2021–2026)

Summary

Led a multi-year creative and strategic transformation of one of Austin’s busiest cocktail bars, evolving
it into a contemporary, culture-driven institution.

Problem

High volume and acclaim without narrative cohesion, visual identity, or digital presence in a rapidly
competitive market.

Approach

Built an agile brand framework centered on narrative cocktail menus, experiential programming, and a
dynamic social presence.

Work

Narrative menus, cocktail creation,  branding systems, website, social media, experiential events, global pop-ups.

Whisler’s is a high volume cocktail bar in Austin, Texas with a storied history, 
famous for establishing East Austin as a nightlife destination. 
Mezcaleria Tobala sits above Whisler’s nad is only open a few nights a week, when I began my creative work at Whisler’s i first started by creating some brand imagery for Tobala. 
First order of business, while working inside the established 4 menus a year framework, was to use those menus not just as a list of drinks but to tell stories with each menu, like this menu from 2022 in which each drink was inspired by a different revolution with spirits and flavor profiles specific to those regions. Each menu was printed in poster format with a historical poster on the back. There were 10 different menus in all, and guests were encouraged to steal the menus and keep for themselves. 
This Menu from 2024 in which we used the cover of patio construction to claim we had found a journal belonging to a botanist from centuries ago with each drink inspired by the plants and flavors we wrote about
We used social media to tell the story with cocktail photography and animated shorts depicting vignettes from our botanists travels.
In the summer of 24’ the theme was “Italian Summer”. I wrote a 14 line sonnet telling the story of a young woman finding herself on an endless summer vacation to Italy with each drink corresponding to a line in the sonnet.
The next order of business was using social media to create high energy reels depicting the bartenders as rockstars. 
We created new merch that helped tell the story of our brand, like these hoodies from our Winter 23’ collection advertised here being used in our ice house where we cut all of our big cubes. 
The following slides are a few more examples of creative ways I used media to create a cocktail bar that was more than just drinks but a creative space, like these pages from a zine we produced for our annual mezcal party in which we invite everyone to come and try our new barrel selections, or the following animation for our Fat Tuesday party, and lastly a surrealist video used to promote the drop of a recent menu. 
Design for our Summer 2026 frozen cocktail cans.