Even beyond Nigel Tufnel’s amp, our annual label contest has gone to 12 — 12 years of highbrow art and lowbrow comedy. Grab a beer and check out this year’s label contest winners.

We love beer labels, we really do. Because we know that a plain old bottle can never express the greatness of the homebrew it contains. Sure, you know what’s inside, but a good label tells the world that your beer deserves respect. And if that’s true, judging by the many hundreds of entries we received this year for our annual label contest, there’s quite a few good homebrews out there (and hey, if they’re actually not tasty at least they look good!).

This year’s competition was another tough one, especially with so many great entries to judge. We examined. We pondered. We agonized. And finally we came to a few agreements: being blonde is grand (if you’re a beer), being lucky is golden, being cranky is actually good (silver medal good) and being nimble is bronze-worthy. Ladies and gentlemen, raise your pint glasses to the winner’s of Brew Your Own’s 2008 Annual Label Contest. Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to everyone who entered!