As a creative girl in a creative world, my daily work fluxuates amongst projects of all shapes and sizes. We Kolbeco designers work on tasks as small as resizing ads, and as large as full-blown campaigns where an ad is only a small sliver of the work that goes into it. Many times these projects will start with identity and a branding strategy, and morph into many levels of marketing materials needed to tell the story behind this new entity, which most recently happened to be a project that landed on my desk courtesy of Cullinan Properties.
Standing at the corner of Euclid Avenue and Delmar Blvd I take in my latest challenge. Although a little rough around the edges, this 150,000 square foot lady has an enormous amount of character and great details. Built in 1910, she was the Langan & Taylor Company headquarters, and acted as a storage and warehouse building. The first floor was home to a number of small retailers, including a drug store, cigar shop, beauty parlor, auction house and tailor. Now, however 625 Euclid is undergoing a major facelift and receiving a new purpose.
It will now have the privilege of being host to high end lofts and street level retail, and boast amenities like a rooftop oasis complete with fire pits, BBQ grills, a croquet field and outdoor kitchen, in addition to other goodies like a pet spa, steam room, gym, and well the list goes on. The other great thing about this piece of this property is that the developer, David Dewey, Senior Vice President – Acquisitions & Development, had an appreciation for the building’s natural character and saw that its raw exposed brick, and exterior details remained as a focal point in maintaining some of its history. He showed an enthusiasm and appreciation for his work and the building that is truly inspiring and helped me gain sight into what I could create as far as identifying this new identity – and so my work began.
It started with developing an identity that both captured the raw history and merging with the modern feel the property would bring to the Central West End.
And 625 Lofts@Euclid was born. I was able to create this feeling of old with new in the logo by using a very modern and contemporary font, and then choosing a color scheme that was complimentary to the building’s earthy brick and concrete exterior with a touch of gold which has a reflective and modern age feel.
Once established, we tackled the website. Something clean and concise. We were initially asked to create a one page site. However after talking through the client’s wants, goals, and needs, we identified that the originally proposed “one-pager” was not going to function as needed, and ultimately would not serve Cullinan well. We were able to adjust the scope and achieve the type of site that visually and functionally made sense. Tying in the established colors, incorporating decorative elements (reflected in all the design pieces) similar to those on the exterior of the build to reinforce the brand, coupled with dynamic copywriting brought this site to life, and subsequently acted as the jumping off point of all the materials that followed from a visual standpoint.
From there, I created a pocket brochure, inserts of all the floorplans, and signage for the property. For the brochure, I worked with our copywriters to develop messaging that created the atmosphere Cullinan was wanting to achieve. Something that helped them to stand alone as an individual and attract the type of tenants who will truly feel at home in the setting they had created. Donned in the burgundy and metallic gold ink and the clean modern fonts chosen for their brand, the brochure for Lofts@Euclid embodies the modern-meets-historic feel we were going for.
A variety of signage was needed for this property to help promote the different stages of development, as well as permanent fixtures. Each sign was thoughtfully made with the idea of brand identity in the forefront. Again, color, fonts, and decorative elements play a huge part in creating consistency for the 625 Lofts@Euclid calling card. It was important however for the temporary signage to “pop” visually so as not to be missed, so I incorporated some bolder complimentary color into them.
The group at Cullinan is a fun and visionary group to work with, and with excellent team work we were collectively able to pull together an exciting campaign we can all be proud of. Keep an eye on their website, as this soon-to-be occupied property is constantly changing and edging ever closer to completion. And with that will come some great photos of an amazing rehab on a St. Louis classic.
And on another note I hope that this clears up at least one or two questions in regard to the commonly asked “What exactly is it that you do, Erin – besides with the dogs?” #TheMoreYouKnow
