Great article on 'the process' and the same way I prefer to approach projects like this! Beautiful sign!
~Amy Donahue
signage consultant
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When customers walk through the door of Classic Design Studio, one of us will get up, walk over and greet him or her. It’s kind of like stepping up to the plate for the team. Sometimes you know what kind of pitch you will be looking at, but most of the time you just have to see what is thrown at you. Recently, we had a customer walk in and give us his pitch. The customer filled us in on the details of a new restaurant he was opening downtown. The restaurant’s name is Chandlers Steakhouse.
The owner explained his vision of an upscale restaurant and lounge with not only great food but also an amazing atmosphere that he wants to be one of the best dining experiences you can have in Boise, Idaho. The owner let us know that he had seen our work and wanted Classic Design Studio to play a big part in the way his restaurant came together visually. Our team loves projects like this one. It wasn’t just the signage we were going to get to swing at, but interior architectural elements as well. With a project like this, everyone on the team gets a chance to dive in and get their uniform dirty.
The Lineup
The great thing about Classic is the way a collection of individuals brings their best efforts and talents to the table to turn what could be an everyday sign project into something very special. All great teams need a great leader, and ours is something special. Noel Weber is the owner and founder of Classic Design Studio. Noel’s reputation in our industry is well-known; Google the words Letterheads and Noel Weber if you are curious. He is absolutely passionate about what he does and helps guide his team to deliver a well-polished product at the end of every project.
Even though each one of the crew specializes in certain areas, everybody is extremely versatile. The designers can paint, cut, engineer and install. The engineers can design as well as everything that goes into fabrication. Being a flexible team means that even though we are relatively small, (shop of eight) we still keep production under way when we are down a man or two. With a project like Chandlers, we needed each member’s talents, and, as usual, everyone put in 100 percent.
Initial Contact
After the initial meeting that consisted mostly of a show and tell for both parties, Classic gave Chandlers’ owner and his design team a more in-depth view into what our previous projects have looked like, a walk-through of our facilities and an understanding of our capabilities. Chandlers then gave us a look at their identity package, elevations and concept renderings. We both had a good idea at this point that this was going to be a great match up.
The First Inning
Now it’s time to hit the field. I received the digital files for the Chandlers identity package and started roughing out ideas for the monument sign. This part of the package is important because it will set a tone for the rest of the signage throughout the project. While I was working on a monument design, another member of our team was working on designs for interior architectural elements. This part of the project will be covered thoroughly by Noel Weber Jr. in a future article. After some initial concepts with the original identity artwork provided to me, we had a meeting with Chandlers.
The customer was happy with what we had come up with, but I did not feel that it was going to have the feel that was expressed to me when we first learned about the project. It wasn’t that I was not happy with the drawings we provided; it was more the box we were put in with the original identity artwork. At this point, I asked Chandlers if we could take some liberties with the identity artwork that was provided to us. At first, they were a little reluctant but soon warmed up to the idea.
The Changeup
We now had the freedom to design a sign that would truly fit the customer’s vision for a classy, clean, upscale, modern steakhouse. I spent a few hours a day playing with designs until I came up with something that looks very close to the finished product. Tall, vertical steel louvers make clean lines that draw the eye up to the sign. The sign face is slightly arched on the top and bottom and curves across the face and back as well. This frames in the lettering and logo, while radiant sculpted lines draw the eye into the copy.
The copy is pearlescent white with a slight fade and gilded bevels. This contrasted well with the dark shades of burgundy used to match the natural colors of rust that would come from leaving the steel on the base raw. Before we presented the artwork to the customer, the whole team had a chance to look over the design and add comments. After a few slight adjustments, we called Chandlers.
We were excited to present this to the customer, but also a little nervous. The new design unfortunately had nothing in common with the original identity artwork that was provided to us. This can, on occasion, be hard for the customer to embrace due to the time the original design has been etched in their mind’s eye of the way things will look.
The Nod
After a few quiet minutes with the owner and his team taking in the design, they consulted each other and decided they liked the new layout. The customer asked if they could take the design back to their office for further review. We received a phone call a few hours later with an excited restaurant owner who had decided to change his entire identity package in order to utilize the graphics we created for the signage. He mentioned that it took an hour or so for his mind to adjust to the new artwork, and he had been working with the original artwork for more than a year. With the approval, it was time to get busy.
Meeting on the Mound
Now it’s time to turn all this design work into something real, and this is where teamwork really comes into play. At this point, we all sit down together to go over the actual engineering, construction schedule and responsibilities for each unit of the signage, which consisted of one large monument sign, two entry signs, interior signage and graphics. We look over each element of the design: how the designer (I) envisioned it in the real world and how we could accomplish the monument’s fabrication as efficiently as possible. This sometimes means calling in a specialist for aspects of the job that we’re not very efficient at or tooled for.
The Grounder
Let’s start at the bottom and work our way up. The base of the monument consisted of eight one-quarter inch by 10-inch by 10-foot vertical plates set at slightly different angles to create a louver effect that changes the gap separation across the width. I designed this on paper, then in Corel X3. I still was not sure that what I had in my mind would translate to reality, so I laid it out in the 3D design program Sketch Up so I could revolve around the louvers and watch them visually open and close. It worked just as I had imagined. There are two horizontal plates; one at the base made of one-half-inch steel and one two-thirds of the way up cut from one-quarter-inch steel that would support the sign and hold it in place. After adding up the weight of all the pieces, it came in at about 1,700 pounds. Our shop’s metal fabrication specialist, Kevin Weere, was definitely capable of the construction of this piece, but the size and weight helped us decide we would contract our local metal shop (Jack’s Metal Works) to fabricate this piece for us.
Unique Strategy
The sign itself would need some careful planning. Because of the design of the base, we could not just bolt the sign face to the structure; it would have to be engineered so that it could slip over the louvers. Remember, we sent the base out to be fabricated at our local metal shop, which always does a great job for us. However when something is out of your hands, especially something the size of this base, there is always a little uneasiness that when the two pieces come together for the first time, they will not mate seamlessly. We provided Jack’s Metal Works with a hard template made from half-inch MDF that was routed on our Gerber Saber. This should insure that the spacing and angles come out correctly.
Gerber Saber working its way through the center panel.
Now that we feel confident that our metal will hold its shape, the face structure can go into production. All the detail that was designed into the face will be carved in relief with the aid of a program we use here at Classic. ArtCam and a talented user (Noel Weber or John McMahon at our shop) can really add a lot of life to a sign face. Noel and I sat down with the artwork and decided what elements to keep raised, push back, add radiuses to, and bevel. There was a lot of additional work that Noel had to figure out for the internal structure that will be explained in part two of this article.
What’s the finish?
Our customer had seen a sign that he liked that had a rusted metal finish. He had mentioned this to me on a few occasions early in the design process, so I did my best to integrate something along that line when I was rendering the designs.
The metal base structure would be left raw so that it would rust naturally. This was nice with this project because it meant that we would not have to move the base to our paint booth or to the powder coaters. It would be straight from Jack’s to the pre-poured pad at the site. The sign face would have a base color of dark burgundy that would blend with the rusted metal. The radiating lines would be painted with a fade that went from a really dark brown burgundy into the background color.
Jason Keeble did the paint work for the sign and got the colors and fades to come out exactly as they were designed. The lettering was half-inch acrylic painted off-white with a fade to beige at the bottom. The Chandlers copy was beveled and gilded, a back plate for each letter painted black was applied to the letters; this created a nice outline for additional contrast. The sub copy had the same treatment as the main copy, minus the fade in color. The logo was completely gilded and beveled. All gilding on this project was done by the most experienced gilder on our roster, none other then Noel Weber Sr.
Let’s put it together
After all the paint was applied, we cleared the sign with a matte finish. It helps the sign face blend with the base structure better. Now it was time to put it all together. The letters and logo were applied with stud mounts and silicone. Everything was handled with protective gloves so the gilded finishes would not be blemished. The base structure was delivered to the site and craned into position on the pad.
We supplied the concrete company with a template for the pad, which was poured with studs that slipped through corresponding holes in the base plate of the steel structure. The base was actually in place about a week before the sign face was ready. This turned out to be very beneficial. It rained a few days after the base was installed and gave the raw metal a chance to rust.
When the rust came the next day, it was a bright orange, not exactly what we were envisioning. This is when we decided to call on more outside talent.
Chris Schofield, a local artist who specializes in metal sculpture, has a lot of experience with metal patinas and how to achieve specific colors and hold them. I met with Chris on site, showed him what we wanted, and we got to work. First we ground off the orange rust, and then Chris applied an acid-based chemical with a spray applicator. Before the acid had a chance to dry, Chris hit the metal with his torch. This turned the metal the color we were looking for. After we arrived at the color we wanted, Chris had us apply a wax seal coat to protect and maintain the patina.
Now that the base was in order, it was time to attach the face. We loaded the face onto the trailer for a short trip over to Chandlers. When we arrived, the crane company was waiting for us. Noel had set I-bolts at both sides of the sign face so that we could attach to the crane straps. The sign face was hoisted above the base and slowly lowered as we guided it onto the louvers. It fit perfectly!
As the face slid down the louvers and into place, a few high fives were given, and we all felt the satisfaction of a job well done. This to me is the same feeling I would get when walking off the field with a win, and knowing everyone on team gave there very best effort to reach that point. So, in case you were wondering why all the sports analogies, well, I’m originally from the Boston area and just finished watching my Red Sox win their second World Series; and hopefully will get a chance to see my Pats have one of the greatest seasons in NFL history this year.
Article Author: John Yarnell. Publication Name: Sign Business. Publication Date: 01/01/2008.
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