(01 / about)
Ten years of manufacturing fascination.
Ford Media Lab opened in September 2016. The cameras came from the first job, a magazine we made for Rémy Cointreau’s Collectif 1806, paid for by work we had already won. Ten years later it is a two-person studio in Miami with a contractor bench, working for the houses we used to work inside.
(02 / the founders)
Kyle Ford
creative_director // director_of_photography
Eighteen years in spirits. Bars in San Francisco and New York, Collectif 1806 at Rémy Cointreau, then the camera. Every AI frame, every composite, and every Hasselblad plate runs through his hands.
Kyle spent three years behind the bar in San Francisco and New York, then managed Collectif 1806 for Rémy Cointreau. He taught himself photography on the cameras the studio's first job paid for, shot and laid out both volumes of 1806 Magazine, and still shoots every Hasselblad plate the lab produces. He tries new production tools the week they ship and keeps the ones that survive a client deadline.
Rachel Ford
managing_partner // executive_producer
Tanqueray and Diageo before the studio, author of 1806 Magazine. She originates the concepts, writes the treatments, and produces every job from brief to delivery.
Rachel was a national brand ambassador for Tanqueray, then led trade marketing inside Diageo, training bartenders and building advocacy programs. She wrote both volumes of 1806 Magazine, nominated for a Spirited Award. At the lab she runs the operating side: scopes, schedules, budgets and the client relationship, from first call to final file. Clients hear from her first and last.
(03 / the origin)
Where it started.
The story starts behind the bar. Or just before it: two corporate careers traded for a one-way move to San Francisco and the craft cocktail world. Three years behind the stick across San Francisco and New York followed, then five inside the brand houses themselves, leading trade programs for Diageo and Rémy Cointreau. Those years meant training bartenders, building advocacy programs, and sitting in the rooms where global budgets met agency decks. That seat came with a view most agencies never get: we were the client. We approved the estimates, sat through the markups, the fragmented vendor chains, and the slow erosion of strategic intent that legacy agency models call process. In 2016 we opened our own studio.
Ford Media Lab opened in a Brooklyn studio and spent its first seven years earning a reputation for high-fidelity content and strategic intelligence. Those years produced work for global portfolios and client relationships that still follow us from brand to brand. They also produced 1806 Magazine, an independent print publication nominated for a Spirited Award. In 2023 the engine moved south, first to a Gulf Coast laboratory in Clearwater, then to Miami in 2025, to a studio built for the way we work now. We kept the Brooklyn hustle and the New York ties. We own the entire production loop, which means one point of accountability and a vision that arrives at delivery exactly as it left intake.
archive // ford mixology lab era, 2011
(04 / the rooms)
Four rooms in ten years.
suite 402, pencil factory, greenpoint // wall: katie merz
suite 501, pencil factory // remote shoot, 2021
first florida studio, clearwater // decal: baron von fancy
miami laboratory, hasselblad // present tense
(05 / the studio)
How the work gets made.
01
brief
Every job starts with the commercial question it has to answer, written down before a camera comes out.
02
capture
For client work, the product is photographed for real on a Hasselblad in our studio. The bottle you see is your bottle.
03
build
The world around it is made with AI tools, position-matched to the capture so the light agrees.
04
finish
Every frame is composited and graded by hand. This is where most of the hours go.
05
carry
For retainer clients we run the channels too, so the brand that leaves the studio is the one that shows up in the feed.
(06 / the record)
Diageo
Rémy Cointreau
Pernod Ricard
Suntory Global Spirits
Proximo
Clients follow us across career moves. Rémy Cointreau to Cincoro to Roué. Tanqueray to Plymouth Gin to Wolves Whiskey. Ten years, the same people, expanding scopes.
(07 / the timeline)
Ten years, in order.
// industry_ascension
Mastering the trade. Craft cocktail years across San Francisco and New York, then five years of internal trade marketing leadership for Diageo and Rémy Cointreau. The lab already had its initials: FML began as Ford Mixology Lab, our cocktail consultancy, before media became the medium.
// brooklyn_innovation
Solving for friction. The lab opens in Brooklyn and spends seven years building a reputation for high-fidelity content and strategic intelligence, one studio, one painted wall, and one repurposed sound room at a time.
// gulf_coast_chapter
Heading south. The lab trades Brooklyn for Florida’s Gulf Coast: a Clearwater studio, a new door, and the production foundation the next engine would demand.
// miami_expansion
The Miami studio opens in Wynwood. Studio capture and AI production move into one room.