Pro­duc­tion Design: Bring­ing Cre­ative Sig­nage Con­cepts to Life

Blend­ing cre­ativ­i­ty and pre­ci­sion is a del­i­cate bal­ance the pro­duc­tion design­ers at Lat­i­tude strike every day.

What does the pro­duc­tion design depart­ment do at Latitude?

There are two major aspects of this team’s work:

1. Design cre­ative concepts.
2. Pre­pare sig­nage con­cepts for production.

Every­thing this team does is cus­tom-designed for our clients. The team works so close­ly with pro­duc­tion that they are able to active­ly val­ue-engi­neer every design to make sure you get the best mate­ri­als at the best prices while main­tain­ing the visu­al integri­ty of the design.

Pro­duc­tion design­ers take every­thing from pho­tographs to rough sketch­es to archi­tec­tur­al plans and trans­late them into pre­cise draw­ings with spec­i­fi­ca­tions so the pro­duc­tion team knows thick­ness­es, sizes, exact­ly where to cut and drill holes, what mate­ri­als and col­ors to use, and what the sign should say.

The design­ers also stretch their cre­ative mus­cles and come up with their own unique designs. Donor walls are one area where design­ers get real­ly cre­ative. ​“Some clients show us an emp­ty space and give us the free­dom to fill it with some­thing new and dis­tinc­tive. And we can do that for them,” says Eugene Peart, Direc­tor of Design.

What is chal­leng­ing about your role?

“Attempt­ing to draw a com­pli­cat­ed design that’s nev­er been done before and make sure it can be built into some­thing tan­gi­ble is a chal­lenge,” says Ashley.

“We are con­stant­ly learn­ing dif­fer­ent ways to pro­duce prod­ucts,” says Eugene. ​“We fre­quent­ly have face-to-face meet­ings with pro­duc­tion to dis­cuss the cor­rect process to make it hap­pen. We are very good about work­ing togeth­er to come up with a solu­tion and push­ing our own capabilities.”

What is reward­ing about your role?

The team agrees that see­ing their designs come to life and delight the cus­tomers is the best. ​“See­ing a com­plet­ed project up on the walls or out­side of a busi­ness while you are out and about with friends and fam­i­ly and being able to say, ​‘Hey we did that!’ It does­n’t mat­ter if I worked on it per­son­al­ly or not, just rec­og­niz­ing our prod­uct out there for the world to see is a reward­ing expe­ri­ence,” design­er Anna Pana­da says.

Ash­ley worked on the Uni­ver­si­ty of Iowa Stead Fam­i­ly Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal’s sig­nage, and it was a lot of hard work to get the design­er’s con­cepts to work for pro­duc­tion. ​“Now every time I see a news high­light or UIHC com­mer­cial on TV, I can’t help but smile and think about how I played a small role in cre­at­ing such an amaz­ing facil­i­ty,” says Ashley.

Where do you find inspiration?

Pro­duc­tion design­ers find inspi­ra­tion every­where. ​“When I’m out and about in the world, I take pho­tos of cool stuff, even if it’s not sig­nage. If it looks real­ly cool, I try to think of way to use the design on a sign,” says Ashley.

What’s the most impor­tant thing about your department?

The design­ers in this depart­ment have an eye for detail and a col­lab­o­ra­tive spir­it. Pro­duc­tion design­ers work with both the sales teams to under­stand the clients’ goals and pro­duc­tion experts to fig­ure out the best ways to pro­duce the desired look.

Have ques­tions on sign design? Let’s con­nect!

More to explore:

• Design-Build Sig­nage: What you want. When you want. With­in Bud­get.
• Trans­form­ing spaces and cre­at­ing expe­ri­ences with placemaking. 
• When design & man­u­fac­tur­ing col­lab­o­rate, clients win!