A Very Good Tomato Sauce

Bloomville, New York

When Alison Roman set out to bottle her tomato sauce, the brief was not to create another celebrity pantry item. The goal was to build something that felt inevitable, as if it had always belonged on the shelf.

We crafted a visual world that feels at home in real kitchens. The creative direction draws from early 20th-century art movements that reduced form to line and color, returning to essentials. The palette is anchored in primary tones and elemental shades, echoing the simplicity of tomato, oil, and salt. Rather than leaning on literal food imagery, we collaborated with artist Audrey Helen Weber to develop a whimsical, storybook illustration language. The drawings capture the spirit of the recipes rather than depicting ingredients outright. They are playful, expressive, and human without becoming sentimental. Typography remains effortless and confident, sometimes behaving as structure and sometimes as artwork in its own right. The system balances clarity with personality, allowing the jar to feel authored rather than branded.

Designed to stand beside legacy pantry staples, First Bloom launches as a single product while establishing a scalable foundation. It is deceptively simple and deliberately refined.

creative direction
Polonsky & Friends

graphic design
Sara Steege

illustration
Audrey Weber