2200 opened in 2006 as an upscale, urban lifestyle and entertainment complex. In 2010, Michael Courtney Design was asked to revitalize the visual identity and develop a strategy to move visitors thru the complex. Our work involved everything from environmental graphics to developing a brand vocabulary. The Welcome message surrounded by city lights represents the spirit of the changes.

The mixed use project is adjacent to the new Amazon.com campus, nestled between downtown Seattle and the high tech South Lake Union neighborhood.

To differentiate the three distinct levels of the project and create a bigger visual  ‘kit of parts’, we used photos as colorful, iconic elements. The photos represent: Street Car (P3: Street Level), City Lights (Level 1: Plaza Level) and Bamboo (Level 2).

We redesigned the communication graphics in a clean contemporary style that speaks to the visitors, and makes updating easy for the client.

The “City Lights” photo became a unifying image and key part of the brand vocabulary. It’s a perfect fit for a complex set among city lights and bustling downtown energy.

To encourage visitors to move throughout the muiti-level site, we designed new directories and way finding signage.

The City Lights theme is underscored by Illuminated details integrated into the directory.

In the Garage, the first greeting is crucial for guests who arrive via car. We created new graphics to simplify the message and welcome visitors.

Each floor has its own distinctive color and simplified messaging to help visitors find their way.

2200 houses a luxury hotel (Pan Pacific Seattle), gourmet grocer (Whole Foods), restaurants (Tutta Bella Neapolitan Pizzeria, Sea Star Restaurant & Raw Bar, Starbucks), retailers, services and 261 private residences.

The project team: Vulcan, Inc., and fabricators CREO, Rainier Industries and Tube Art.
http://www.discoverslu.com/

After our long time client, Everett Clinic (TEC) sent us a package for business leaders describing their leadership position in health care, we invited them out for coffee.

TEC has received considerable recognition for their “accountable care organization” (ACO) leadership position as reported in a recent Puget Sound Business Journal article. If you’ve followed the news about the proposed changes in health care, you’ll recognize that ACO is at the forefront of the conversation.

We’ve worked with TEC on dozens of projects and so I felt comfortable (gently) telling them I didn’t think the piece I received spoke to the business community – it looked more like a marketing piece. And although the business community is very interested in the cost of health care, the look and feel needed a business-to-business tone if TEC was going to get their attention and have credibility.

I brought some examples, discussed how good design can create the right tone to fit the intended audience and offered to on future projects.

We were pleased when TEC called back and asked us to apply our comments to a new communications piece they would present at a Washington, DC hearing on Health Care Reform.

We recommended an upbeat, business-to-business look and feel (not marketing) that highlighted key information and adjusted the data heavy content to be more digestible.  Completing the work after TEC’s approval took just a couple of days.  They flew to DC and we understand the hearing was a great success.

Link to article:

http://seattle.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2010/05/24/story3.html

https://www.everettclinic.com/

http://www.acosummit.com/

MCD creates pro-bono projects for selected projects and organizations and one of my favorites is TOPS at Seward, a Seattle Public School. This spring, I was invited to create a poster for the TOPS Talent Showcase.

The Talent Showcase is a low-key opportunity for students to show their stuff in front of their classmates, friends, parents and family members. Over the years, we’ve been entertained by musicians, singers and actors, along with more unique acts: joke tellers, magicians, circus acts and unicycle riders. It’s fun, sweet and totally home grown.

The crowd fills the folding chairs and the house lights in the school gym are dimmed. A parent MC steps on stage to welcome the crowd and start the show. Parents get a quick photo as kids go on stage with confidence or reluctance. Watching the whole scene, I always feel like I’m in a small town, not bustling Seattle.

I have a long history with TOPS, starting as an Artist In Residence for the Seattle Public Schools and the Washington State Arts Commission – my first job after moving to Seattle. As a parent, my role has evolved into volunteering design, strategy, and art direction for events and communications pieces when invited.

Our goal with these projects is to reach kids and parents and move them to action. We develop a strong concept to grab attention, and to cut thru the explosion of images, colors, and messages of daily life. Gee, sounds like what we do for our other clients.

A selection of past posters is below. As designer, I’ve happily included family members in the projects: Conor is ‘showing off’ his artwork in one poster and Kevin’s frog pastel took center stage in another. And this year, my client was the organizer of the Showcase, Chris – my wife.

]]> http://www.michaelcourtneydesign.com/recent-work/talent-showcase-at-tops/feed 0 http://www.michaelcourtneydesign.com/advertising/mychart http://www.michaelcourtneydesign.com/advertising/mychart#comments Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:49:14 +0000 Michael Courtney Design http://www.michaelcourtneydesign.com/?p=979
You’ve heard the quote: “if you have your health, you’ve got everything.” Most of us would add: “That’s true – and I’d like 24/7 access to my health records, too!”

If you’re a patient at The Everett Clinic, you now have convenient, on line access to your medical records thanks to a new program: MyChart. To help promote this new benefit to their patients and staff, The Clinic has turned to the team at Michael Courtney Design (MCD). The Clinic has an ambitious target: increasing enrollment by 30% in 2010. With the new campaign, they’re well on their way.

MCD’s assignment: develop two campaigns for MyChart. Both campaigns build on the distinctive branding MCD has created with the TEC team over a five-year period.

What are the advantages of having access to your electronic medical records? Maybe you want to check your last blood pressure reading, or find out when your child had their last tetanus shot. When you sign up for MyChart, you can check your records, at your convenience, on-line, day or night.

The External Campaign reminds existing Clinic patients to sign up for MyChart, and encourages non-patients to check out the program benefits.  MCD designed a series of ads showing ‘real’ people in day-to-day settings accessing their records at home or on the go. The ads prompt the target audience to see themselves using the service.

“One a Day”, the Internal program, encourages Clinic staff/physicians to enroll one patient per day into the program. MCD created a distinctive logo the Clinic will use for internal on line and print communications.

The project team included copywriter Kevin Jones, who continues to provide the written ‘voice’ of the Clinic.

“Founded in 1924, The Everett Clinic is a nationally recognized, locally owned physician group practice with nearly 300 physicians and more than 1,500 staff. We provide care to approximately 250,000 patients each year and specialize in more than 40 medical, surgical and diagnostic fields at 16 locations throughout Snohomish County, Washington.”

Links:
http://www.everettclinic.com/

PATH has matured quickly from a garage-based start-up to a recognized leader in global health. With a growing staff, the need for more space and the desire to be close to “peers and colleagues”, PATH has relocated to Seattle’s booming South Lake Union neighborhood. Michael Courtney Design (MCD) was commissioned to design a comprehensive environmental graphics program for the new location that captures the spirit of this entrepreneurial organization.

Collaborating with UNICEF, the World Health Organization, local groups and the private sector, PATH currently works in 70 countries “to improve the health of people around the world by advancing technologies, strengthening systems, and encouraging healthy behaviors.”

The new location places PATH among other world-class organizations: amazon.com, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle Biomedical Research Institute, and University of Washington Medicine.

MCD’s role was to identify the new location, welcome and guide 350 team members through three floors of new space (30,000 sq. ft.) and create a Visitor Experience Master Plan to welcome and inform 2,000 visitors/year.

PATH Visitor Experience: in process.

Our goal: develop an authentic, true – to – the- organization Brand Vocabulary for the project. The design solution reflects the low-tech conditions PATH encounters in the field, the high tech research in their labs and the practical, site specific solutions PATH is known for producing.

Environmental Graphics material palette.

The project team: PATH, The Seneca Group (owners rep.), SkB Architects, Sellen, and fabricators Creo and Tube Art.

Links:
http://www.path.org
http://www.senecagroup.com/
http://www.skbarchitects.com/
http://www.discoverslu.com/

Mayor Greg Nickels and the Seattle Design Commission recognized five recent public projects that “exhibit superior design” and “foster interaction with the public and enhance Seattle neighborhoods” at a ceremony in Seattle’s City Hall. “The Woodland Park Zoo Penguin Exhibit is a fantastic example of integrative design…(and) …has lead to a design that goes well beyond showcasing the penguins, their environment and survival.”

MCD was present at the 12/03/09 event and we’re very pleased and honored to be recognized as one of the (many) team members.

Studio Hanson/Roberts designed the exhibit. MCD developed the graphic design for the project.

http://woodlandparkzblog.blogspot.com/

SEATTLE DESIGN COMMISSION RECOGNIZES PUBLIC PROJECTS

Mayor Greg Nickels will join the Seattle Design Commission to recognize five recent public projects that exhibit superior design. The projects include a public park, a master plan, infrastructure improvements, and a new zoo exhibit. The Seattle Design Commission presents the awards for design excellence every two years after reviewing public projects that foster interaction with the public and enhance Seattle neighborhoods*. Five projects in total are being honored.

Woodland Park Zoo Humboldt Penguin Exhibit

“The Woodland Park Zoo Penguin Exhibit is a fantastic example of integrative design. Adherence to a comprehensive, well-defined scope and a vigorous process has lead to a design that goes well beyond showcasing the penguins, their environment and survival. The project achieves a new benchmark of impressive sustainability and multicultural educational objectives and includes the capacity for on- going monitoring and adjustment. The exhibit’s low-key attitude and careful attention to design fit strengthens a significant entrance to the zoo and reinforces the overall legibility of its environment.”

(From the City of Seattle and Seattle Design Commission Press Release)

*Past recipients include: distinctive civic and cultural projects and parks, buildings and spaces throughout Seattle including the Seattle Central Library (Rem Koolhaas, Office of Metropolitan Architecture; LMN Architects); Olympic Sculpture Park  (Weiss/Manfredi Architects; Charles Anderson Landscape Architecture) and Fremont Peak Park (GGLO).

It may be the ultimate branding test: helping a real-estate agent stand out in a field that is beyond crowded and market to an affluent audience looking for distinctive homes.

Fortunately, Carol Meachum gave us plenty to work with. As a experienced agent representing sellers in Seattle’s most desirable urban neighborhoods, she brings an exceptional level of professionalism and experience to her work. Our job was to counter the gravitational pull of the real estate industry, where scattershot direct mail is the favored marketing tool. Instead, we recommended developing smart, distinctive marketing materials that look like they belong on the coffee tables of these homes – alongside brochures for other lifestyle purchases and investments.

The result? A coordinated set of highly targeted print pieces, as well as a ‘can’t put it down’ leave-behind package. Details like embossing, rich color, textured paper, and materials align her image with the high-quality residences she sells. (And we managed to do all of this on a budget that was far from corporate-sized.)

Of course, printers are every designer’s secret weapon. For this job, we called on Robert Horsley of Robert Horsley Printing (Seattle) and Bellingham-based Bison Bindery, handled the unique, Japanese stab binding.

Though we’re known for our business-savvy solutions, sometimes a project comes along that is just plain fun.  Our latest? The penguin exhibit at Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo. Info and photos after the jump.

Though we’re known for our business-savvy solutions, sometimes a project comes along that is just plain fun.  Our latest? The Humbolt penguin exhibit at Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo.

The Woodland Park Zoo (WPZ) recently gave a serious makeover to the 62-year old exhibit, which had originally been designed for seals and sea lions. We were honored to join a stellar team that included WPZ specialists and the exhibit designers: Studio Hanson/Roberts.

The new, $6.5 million, 17,000 sq. ft. outdoor exhibit presents an authentic view of the rugged, arid coastline of Peru, home to the penguins.

Our job? To create environmental graphics to make visitors feel they’d stepped into the Peruvian fishing village of Punta San Juan, at the largest Humboldt penguin conservation zone in the world.

We developed Peruvian-style graphics and applied them to murals, gates and other graphic elements to greet, inform, and persuade visitors they were in a remote village in South America. We used the same graphic style to develop donor recognition materials for partners and friends of the project. And in a proud first for our studio, we designed a graphic celebrating the merits of guano.

The real star of the show: the penguins. Visitors watch thru large walls of glass as the birds swim and dive. “The birds enjoy the public. They like to look (back) at them through the glass,” said a zoo keeper. “They like little kids with shiny shoes and sunglasses and fast-moving hands.”

http://www.zoo.org/penguins/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBYc_aO14jU&feature=fvsr

Project Team:

Woodland Park Zoo (Scott Vance, interpretive exhibit specialist: Monica Lake, project manager); Studio Hanson/Roberts (Becca Hanson and Jim McDonough – exhibit design); Dillion Works (fabricator of the graphic elements).

“We need help with the Zamboni!”

That was the call from our longtime client The Everett Clinic, which sponsors the iconic ice-resurfacing machine at the Everett’s Comcast Arena, home of the mighty Everett Silvertips, a Western Hockey League team.

It’s a well-documented phenomenon that the beloved Zamboni has a strangely hypnotic effect—crowds can’t take their eyes off it. So The Everett Clinic wanted to make sure their branded graphics were worth staring at.

We developed the tagline,  “For a healthier body check,” and matched it with a great action shot. It took more than a little tweaking to make the photo and graphics look great on a lumpy machine not designed to display them, but the final result was a big, er, hit.

http://www.everettsilvertips.com/
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/23/sports/hockey/23zamboni.htmlzamboni

To listen to the broadcast click link: CBC Early Edition Clip

Link to the Early Edition’s site.
http://www.cbc.ca/earlyedition/