From Concept Through Completion
One crucial step along the path of connecting brand to place happens when we think about the user journey from arrival through departure. Our project manager plays a critical role in working with signage vendors to ensure the designs we create translate to space.
“Designing for the built environment doesn’t start or end with design. Not the way most typically think about design.
To start, we send our designers (and myself) to the project site for an extensive survey to fully understand and study the existing environment.
We measure everything —
Whether starting from scratch or refacing existing signage or environmental graphics, having several, verified points to the scale of the environment is crucial.
We photograph everything —
Capturing existing conditions up close and from a distance yields a strong baseline and point of reference as we dive into design.
We develop the strategic plan —
What are we touching? What is the best way to get from A to B? What are the most important functions of the new graphics / signage? And only once we come this far, do we launch into conceptual design.
By approaching strategy first, we know that the designs our team develop can flex and bend to the (inevitable) challenges that arise through permitting, production and installation. Something will always raise a question when transitioning from concept to reality. It might be a production efficiency, a new environmental constraint, a request for value engineering (VE) to meet a reduced budget or a code limitation getting in the way, but since we have defined the strategy on the front end, we have a clear measuring stick from which to make decisions as initial plans and designs have to evolve.
This is why we push to be a strategic right hand to our clients beyond conceptual design. Through material sample review, production drawing approval and prototyping, we become the consistent check and balance against the core strategy. Without this common thread, assumptions get made, intents get misinterpreted and a consistent, connected experience gets weakened.
Starting with strategy, through concepting, and to completion — Branding For The Built Environment® is strongest when supported by flexibility, ongoing problem solving and an eye for design.”
—
Lauren Riedling
Project Manager
