Rubio & del Amo placed 9,427 dots by hand for this flour identity

Flour packaging rarely ventures beyond the predictable. Murcia-based studio Rubio & del Amo, led by Creative Directors Guillermo Rubio and Julián Garnés, saw this sector’s visual conservatism as an opportunity rather than a constraint. For Harinas La Encarnación, a mill 30 kilometres from their studio in Spain, they developed an identity system that respects tradition whilst giving it contemporary relevance. The name itself carries local significance. La Encarnación references the Virgin of the Incarnation, patron saint of the town where the mill operates. Religious symbols remain common in traditional Spanish industries, and the studio chose to engage with this heritage directly. The dove, a Christian symbol of the Holy Spirit associated with the Incarnation, became the central visual element. But the conceptual connection runs deeper than iconography. “Conceptually, the Incarnation is about making the divine human – turning something invisible into something tangible and real,” explains Rubio. “In the same way, flour – a simple, basic ingredient – is transformed into bread, an essential, life-giving product. It’s a direct analogy: turning something simple into something vital and visible.” This transformation informed the visual approach. The pointillism painting technique offered a way to express both the physical nature of flour and the conceptual journey from raw material to finished product. Rubio & del Amo’s take on it wasn’t generated algorithmically, each illustration comprises 9,427 dots, placed individually in vector software. “With AI and plug-ins that do everything automatically, we decided to do it all by hand,” notes Rubio. “We started from photos and placed each dot one by one. Only this way could we control the exact result.” The white dot pattern serves a dual function, evoking flour scattered across a surface whilst creating depth through varying densities. This painstaking process results in illustrations that feel both crafted and contemporary – a balance the studio sought throughout the project.