Jacque Irizarry—a.k.a. @_hoppenstance on Instagram—is an artist, graphic designer, and photographer who uses her art to help others. Her tagline is, fittingly, “full of hops and hope,” and that grounded optimism helps shine a light into dark places.
Irizarry, a Hispanic lesbian, aims to promote underrepresented people in the beer industry. She offers design and marketing to breweries aligned with those values through her business, Jaqpot Designs, and creates evocative label art with astrological and botanical imagery that calls for greater social change—backed up with action.
In summer 2022, Irizarry brought her label 21—a tribute to the victims of the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas—to the Lehigh Valley Brewers Guild in Pennsylvania, proposing members create a charity collaboration brew. Ten local breweries brought her idea to life through a Hazy IPA that donated 100% of sales, over $3,000, to Victims First, a nonprofit dedicated to helping victims of mass-casualty crime. It was the Guild’s first charity brew, and Irizarry’s idea inspired it to launch a series of such collabs. She donated her design and chose to forgo payment; she says she even forgot to put her Instagram handle on the can.
“I don’t just want to create beer labels,” Irizarry says. “I want them to be meaningful … tied to [people] who may need help.”
Currently, Irizarry is seeking brewery partners to create Mountains of Love, a collaboration brew dedicated to the victims of the Club Q shooting in Colorado. Irizarry hopes proceeds will be used to plant a tree for each soul felled too soon, plus donations to the families or an LGBTQ+ organization. She’s also been selected as one of three artists to design fundraising merchandise for the advocacy organization Women of the Bevolution.
“The beer industry can feel … very narrow in its view and appearance,” she says. “I want to help break the mold by letting everyone know they are allowed in this space.”
The desire comes from her own struggles getting hired in the industry, yet even this she wouldn’t change. For Irizarry, it’s all about perspective, shadow and light dancing in infinite interplay, as her photography reflects. “I do believe I am right on time and where I am meant to be in order to foster the change I am looking for in this industry and this world,” she says. Both are lucky to have her.
Words,Holly Regan