Vento Sul
A south wind takes its time. So does the next glass.
A neighbourhood wine bar bistro in Arroios, Lisbon, taken from an idea to a finished product: name, identity, wine list and menu, photography direction and a bilingual website with booking.
- Type
- Concept project: a dry run of a full client job
- Year
- 2026
- Services
- Naming and positioning · Brand identity · Wine list and menu · Photography direction · Web design and build (EN/PT) · Booking flow · Local SEO
01Origin
A client I invented, to learn the whole job
Vento Sul was a test: take one potential client from the first idea to a finished product, and find out everything that job really needs.
I spent six years in professional kitchens, the last of them as a head chef in Lisbon. I know what a small place needs from its brand, because I've stood behind the pass when it didn't have one. What I needed to learn was the rest of the job: naming, identity, photography, a website, booking, the legal small print, and how long each takes when one person does them all.
So I invented a client. A real one brings a real brief and real limits; a concept let me run the whole process end to end and write down every step, so the next job starts from a checklist instead of a blank page.
- 01Name
- 02Positioning
- 03Identity
- 04List and menu
- 05Photography
- 06Website
- 07Booking and law
- 08Testing
The job, in the order it had to happen. Each one is a chapter below.
Everything about Vento Sul is invented except the street, the wines and the way a good neighbourhood bar works. The site says so on the first screen.
02The brief
London-confident, still local
Make a small neighbourhood wine bar feel as confident online as the best restaurant sites in London and New York, without losing what makes it local.
Vento Sul is built for the Tuesday regulars, not passing tourists. About 25 covers, reservation first, Tuesday to Sunday, 18:00 to midnight, with a few bar seats held back every night for whoever wanders in.
Most small Lisbon venues have one of two websites: a template with a menu PDF, or a social profile with no booking. I set out to show a third option an owner could actually afford.
Feel like walking in
One page that feels like the room, not a brochure.
Book from anywhere
One tap from any screen, with no dead ends.
One moment of play
Something people remember and send to a friend.
Built for Lisbon
Portuguese and English, local search, local rules.
03The world
A name, a story, a list
The name came first, and everything else was built to agree with it.
- The nameVento Sul, the south wind: slower to arrive than you'd expect and worth the wait, the same as the next glass.
- The signA hand-painted wordmark with a weathervane arrow through it and a rooster perched on the S, a nod to Portugal's own.
- The listFive wines by the glass from five corners of Portugal, €6 to €8, and a short cellar by region. It changes when the good stuff runs out, not on a schedule.
- The platesPetiscos under their own names: conservas of the week, croquetes, grilled octopus, cheese with quince.
- The voiceKnowledgeable, not lecturing. No wine puns. Buttons say what they do: "Hold the table", not "Submit".
Small producers, short list
Changes when the good stuff runs out. Mark a bottle as sold and watch the list keep up.
By the glass
The cellar
Plates
04Identity
The identity comes from the building
A hand-painted sign, a weathervane arrow and a rooster, set on worn Arroios limewash.
The wordmark, drawn by hand
The rooster
The arrow
Stamped in cork
Etched on the window
On the staff tee
The list, printed nightly
Painted over the doorPick things up. Everything here is on the site.
Seven colours, each with one job. Tap to copy.
A high-contrast serif for headlines and prices. The wordmark itself is artwork, never re-set in type.
Everything else, from the story to the button labels. Body text always meets 4.5:1 contrast.
The rules: every section has one background and one accent. Photography is never tinted. No wine puns, and no em dashes.
05The website
Five worlds, one scroll
The site is one scroll through five full-screen worlds, and the header recolours and renames itself as you move between them.
The street
One statement, with the address and the concept label pinned to the first screen.
The painted shopfrontThe room
The story: built for the Tuesday regulars, not passers-by.
LimewashThe vane
The weathervane wine picker, the one toy on the site.
Rose, tiledThe list
Five wines by the glass, the cellar by region, the plates.
Azulejo blueFind us
Address, hours, walk-in policy, directions, the complaints book.
InkLet the wind choose
The logo's weathervane becomes a toy. Spin it, and wherever the wind blows from picks your glass from the list. Each spin pours a new glass into tonight's flight and never repeats. After the first pour, a Book button appears.
A south wind always lands on the Alentejo. It reads N, E, S, O, the Portuguese way, and works from the keyboard.
Spin the vane. Wherever the wind blows from, that's your glass.
Tonight's flight: nothing poured yet
Hold the table
Book and Info open over whatever you're looking at, so you never lose your place. Pick the party, the night and a half-hour slot. A full slot doesn't just say no: it offers the two nearest free times and reminds you bar seats are held for walk-ins.
Try a struck-through time. The confirmation speaks in the bar's own voice.
Book a table
Holding your table…
You're in.
No need to rush over. We'll hold the table.
This is a concept, so no real booking was made.
Portuguese first, for Portuguese browsers
The site opens in European Portuguese for Portuguese-language browsers and remembers the choice. Everything is translated, down to the lines the page writes as you use it.
The official complaints book, the Livro de Reclamações, is linked in the footer, as Portuguese businesses must provide it. The search listing tells Google it's a bar in Arroios, with its hours and that it takes reservations.
A south wind takes its time.
So does the next glass. A wine bar bistro in Arroios, open Tuesday to Sunday from six.
06The design loop
Every piece had to beat a reference
Every piece was built against a named reference and had to pass three critics before it shipped.
Sketch in London was the main bar to beat, studied frame by frame from a screen recording, alongside 100 Maneiras, Crown Shy, The Four Horsemen, WatchHouse and Blank Street. From Sketch came seven checkable rules: one statement on the first screen, a header with only Info and Book, the address pinned to the landing, each section its own world, one toy per world, info as an overlay, booking one tap from anywhere.
The headline's top line sat on a pale wall and was hard to read.
Spins repeated wines, the result sat a screen away, then the needle turned round the wrong point.
Straight quotes in the wine names, replaced with proper ones across the site.
Passed first time.
Each circle is a round. A cross is a no, with the gap it named.
07How it was made
Human-directed, AI-produced
The tools did the making; every decision about what Vento Sul is, and what's good enough to carry its name, was mine.
| Part | Tools | My role |
|---|---|---|
| Name, positioning, voice | Aaron & Claude assisted | The concept, the rules, every line approved |
| Wordmark and rooster | Adobe Illustrator | Drawn by hand |
| Wine list and menu | Six years in kitchens | Producers, regions, prices, dishes |
| Photography | AI image generation | Art direction, every shot chosen |
| Website | Claude (build, design loop, audits), Impeccable (polish) | Design, structure, every feature decision |
Issues an automatic checker found on the first version of the site, and on the rebuild. The two left are deliberate: the street photo sits flush under the header.
08Testing
200 visitors, and six fixes the same day
I put the site in front of 200 simulated visitors, 25 from each of eight audiences, to find out who it works for and where it breaks.
The panel was synthetic: AI personas built to match Arroios locals, Lisbon expats, tourists planning a trip, wine enthusiasts, food writers, boutique hospitality owners, Instagram arrivals and sceptical visitors. It's directional, not a substitute for real guests.
missed the concept note, and 29 believed Vento Sul was a real bar. Those who missed it trusted the site far less: 3.7 out of 10, against 5.5.
● one visitor who missed the note
- The vane works185 of 200 found it, and it tied with the wine list as the favourite world.
- Owners liked it mostThey are the audience that matters, and they scored it highest: 5.2 intent to hire, highest among small wine bars of about 25 covers.
- It looked too realPlaceholders gave it away too late: an all-zeros phone number, no door number, an Instagram handle that went nowhere.
- The list needed a buyer's eyeWine people caught a glass labelled with the wrong grape, and an orange pour promised but not on the list.
Six fixes
- A plain label on the first screen: "A concept, not a real bar", in both languages.
- Placeholders that say so, for the phone number and the Instagram handle.
- On phones, the Spin card sits below the compass instead of covering it.
- The list corrected: the Bairrada glass is Luís Pato Baga, and no orange pour promised.
- Two links on the first screen: down to the vane, and to the hours and address.
- For owners, this page now says how booking and the list connect to their own tools.
The vane stays
Sceptical visitors called it a gimmick and gave it 2.4. It's the one moment people remember, and the hours are one tap away on Info.
Testing informs the work; it doesn't write it.
09Timeline
One month from a hand-drawn arrow
28 Aug
Wordmark and rooster drawn in Illustrator
30 Aug
First version of the website built
Early Sep · 7 days
Rebuilt against Sketch and five other references
Three critics, up to three rounds a piece, polished with Impeccable.
27 Sep
200-visitor panel; six fixes made the same day
10What's next
Vento Sul becomes the template
The brief, the design loop, the checklist and the booking flow, ready to start from on day one of a real job. Next: a native speaker's pass on the Portuguese, and a short recording of the vane and the booking flow.
What it means for your business
Most small places open with a name and an Instagram account. Vento Sul shows the whole job done properly, from the arrow on the door to the line in the booking confirmation.
A name that does the work
So the rest of the brand has something to agree with.
One moment people remember
Built from your own story, not a template.
Booking from anywhere
In your guests' language, with no dead ends.
The Lisbon details done
Portuguese copy, the complaints book, local search.
Connected to your tools
Your booking system, and a list you can change yourself.
Opening somewhere? Let's make it feel like walking in.
- Concept, name and direction
- Aaron Reilly
- Writing, research and build
- Aaron Reilly, assisted by Claude; polished with Impeccable
- Photography
- AI-generated, art-directed by Aaron Reilly
Rufus Bramble's Countryman→