Ener­gy in Motion: North­west­ern Col­lege Den Har­tog Ath­let­ic Complex’s Expe­ri­en­tial Branding

North­west­ern Col­lege has trust­ed Lat­i­tude with brand­ing and sig­nage needs for near­ly 25 years. When the North­west­ern team brought a new chal­lenge to the table, we were thrilled to bring a clear Design-Build process, a strong cre­ative vision, and a match to their pas­sion for the project. Through pre­vi­ous col­lab­o­ra­tions, includ­ing a res­i­dence hall ren­o­va­tion, Lat­i­tude was well-posi­tioned to trans­late Northwestern’s brand iden­ti­ty into a bold, ener­getic phys­i­cal space.

Project Back­ground + Goals

North­west­ern College’s ath­let­ic teams have enjoyed suc­cess over recent years, includ­ing Nation­al NAIA Cham­pi­onships. That grow­ing tra­di­tion of excel­lence cre­at­ed the need for ren­o­va­tions and addi­tions to the exist­ing ath­let­ic facility. 

The North­west­ern ath­let­ic depart­ment sought to expand lock­er room space so that teams could have their own lock­er rooms by sport and cre­ate a team meet­ing room, so every square inch of space was impor­tant. Design solu­tions focused on effi­cient use of space. 

North­west­ern College’s com­pre­hen­sive expe­ri­en­tial design pack­age included:

• Exte­ri­or build­ing signage
• Inte­ri­or ADA and code signage
• Donor recog­ni­tion wall and area signage
• Lock­er room and meet­ing room graphics
• Fea­ture wall at the entrance

Col­lab­o­ra­tion Is Key to Success

Northwestern’s team want­ed to empha­size their brand iden­ti­ty, which pro­vid­ed a foun­da­tion with col­or and typog­ra­phy. The Lat­i­tude design team was giv­en cre­ative free­dom to inter­pret and expand on the brand.

Andrej Stein­bergs, Expe­ri­en­tial Graph­ic Design­er at Lat­i­tude, was the lead design­er and was inspired by ath­let­ic move­ment. He want­ed to cre­ate sta­t­ic images that still con­veyed ener­gy, adding vibran­cy and spir­it to the build­ing. The client was recep­tive and excit­ed about Steinberg’s ini­tial designs. 

Design-Build Process for the Win

Stand Out Sig­nage Brands + Brings Life to Den Har­tog Ath­let­ic Complex

Team Meet­ing Room: Pow­er Words Brought to Life

The North­west­ern team want­ed spe­cif­ic pow­er words to be fea­tured on nar­row ver­ti­cal wall pan­els. Run­ning the words hor­i­zon­tal­ly would’ve made them very small and dif­fi­cult to read. Stein­bergs reimag­ined ver­ti­cal text with gra­di­ent bars that lead the eye upward to cre­ate move­ment and focus with­in the tight spaces. Each pow­er word was fab­ri­cat­ed from ½‑inch-thick acrylic, mount­ed on a dark back­ground for con­trast, cre­at­ing a strik­ing, moti­va­tion­al atmosphere. 

Large-scale graph­ics span the back wall of the meet­ing room. The mur­al fea­tures a vinyl appli­ca­tion over red, with mir­rored let­ter­ing on both sides of a room divider, ensur­ing vis­i­bil­i­ty and cohe­sion when the space is split for sep­a­rate events.

Lock­er Room Graph­ics: Strength and Unity

For the foot­ball lock­er room, Lat­i­tude designed end-cap graph­ics for the long rows of lock­ers. The goal with the graph­ics was to cel­e­brate Raider ath­let­ics with­out show­cas­ing indi­vid­ual ath­letes, which would need to be switched out fre­quent­ly. The client pro­vid­ed stun­ning, high-res­o­lu­tion images that gave Stein­bergs the inspi­ra­tion he needed.

“We applied a red mono­chrome fil­ter on the images to keep the focus on ener­gy and team iden­ti­ty,” Stein­bergs not­ed. ​“The lay­ered geo­met­ri­cal ele­ments tie back to the fea­ture wall’s sense of motion.”

This con­sis­ten­cy across design ele­ments estab­lished a uni­fied visu­al lan­guage through­out the facility.

Donor Wall: A Regal Tribute

The donor recog­ni­tion wall was designed with a slight­ly dif­fer­ent tone — ele­gant, time­less, and reverent.

Stein­bergs want­ed the donor recog­ni­tion wall to have a slight­ly dif­fer­ent tone from the oth­er ele­ments. Ban­ner-like forms and metal­lic fin­ish­es add a regal feel to the dis­play. The fin­ished look cre­ates a sophis­ti­cat­ed fea­ture that hon­ors donor con­tri­bu­tions and con­trasts with the high-ener­gy ath­let­ic spaces.

The Result