PBS is one of our favorite clients to work with, and we are honored to be a part of the continued legacy of Washington Week. Check out this great write-up of our design from our friends at NewscastStudio and tune in Friday nights or watch online to see it for yourself!
It’s no longer enough for an organization to simply have a well-crafted interior.
Today’s spaces for consumers and corporations transcend traditional interior design by strengthening the role of storytelling within a branded environment. To accomplish this, brands increasingly rely on the integration of cutting-edge technology, allowing stakeholders to engage their surroundings on multiple levels and crafting interactions that lend a heightened sense of meaning and purpose.
Branded environments combine careful messaging and architectural vocabulary to reinforce and elevate a brand’s position in their experiential design.
So, what makes branded environments unique? How can a company benefit from this form of interior design? Here are some of the most common questions we encounter.
Q: Within the realm of the built environment, what is the unique qualifier of a “branded” environment?
A: Branded environments are like any designed environment in that they focus on formal and material design development. But they are also distinguished by participatory, content-rich programs that relevantly communicate one-to-one with target audiences.
It’s a “form follows content” paradigm, reliant upon robust content development, market benchmarking, behavioral and anthropological studies, lifestyle trending, narrative theory, and learning modalities, as well as business best practices.
The actual design of products, services, events, and environments is inextricably linked to the ability to interpret content and to extend abstract ideas and elements into physical form.
Q: Why have branded environments become an important marketing extension for so many consumer-facing companies?
A: The fractionalization of the consumer audience and their demand for personalization has created a profound and well-documented shift. Brands and marketers want and need new ways to engage their audiences.
Effective experiential design recognizes consumer demand for personalization, relevancy, and life-style recognition. Foremost, it promotes sustained and extended live audience exchange.
Q: What is the value proposition for the client?
A: Effective experiential design programs exponentially extend the consumer audience engagement time when compared with traditional advertising. Experiential programs and environments create a powerful opportunity for brands to immerse, interact with, and affect the behaviors of their audience. When audience engagement time is extended, the potential for both emotional connection and brand loyalty increases. This factor of time correlates directly with an increase in sales of products and services.
To put it simply: a thoughtful branded environment maximizes the time your audience spends with your brand. That investment of attention yields new loyalty, which in turn drives sales.
In today’s competitive, media-saturated world it’s especially true that time (attention) is money.
Q: What types of techniques are employed to create branded environments over traditional interior design?
A: Along with extensive research to help hone and interpret an organization’s story, branded environments often employ deeper integration of technology, environmental graphics, and way-finding design.
Through these techniques, branded environments can help connect a brand with its purpose and culture by creating a tangible expression in a built environment.
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“On Air” is an internally produced series of staff interviews that showcase the talent and personalities of the people who keep Clickspring ticking. Our debut installment features a conversation between Design Director Kendra James and Designer Donna Lee. Kendra joined Clickspring in 2012 and holds a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Texas at Arlington and a Master of Architecture from Pratt Institute, while Donna hails from Devonport, New Zealand, holds both a Bachelor of Architectural Studies and a Master of Architecture from The University of Auckland, and is the newest designer to join the Clickspring ranks.
We join our heroes on a warm June day at Clickspring HQ in Manhattan, where they sit adjacent to one another.
Kendra James, Design Director (left) and Donna Lee, Designer (right) pose outside the Clickspring Design Manhattan office.
Kendra James: Okay, let’s go.
Donna Lee: (in Kiwi accent) Mate, ready.
KJ: So, Donna, what was the last thing you watched on TV and why did you watch it?
DL: Okay, hold on. I’m just getting a little stage fright right now…wait don’t write that. (laughs) Ever since I arrived in New York about eight months ago people have been telling me to watch Broad City. I just wanted to try it out and ended up watching three episodes. So good.
KJ: I love that show! Wow, so you’ve been in the city for eight months now! Awe, you’re still so fresh. What has been your biggest NYC challenge since moving from New Zealand?
DL: (sighs) There have been a few. Two things that pop into my head right now… One, people don’t understand me through my accent. I’m trying to sound more American but I still have to repeat myself a lot. Second thing, the product packaging here! Why do you have to package every little item up? And I don’t understand double bagging. It shocked me that the cashier was shocked when I asked for a single bag.
KJ: (chortles) Right… when you attempt to use your American accent on me I get even more confused but I think your American accent is way better than my Kiwi accent.
DL: (laughs) You sound like… I don’t even know where, what, how, why. You just merge and Australian and British accent and it sounds bonkers. But girl, I love you anyway.
KJ: Okay, now you ask me a question.
DL: So, you’re a creative person. How do you get unstuck creatively?
KJ: I shake it off, literally.
DL: Yeah, I know. Like when you do your spontaneous one minute dance parties…by yourself.
KJ: (laughs) Exactly…I feel like you already knew the answer to that question. But yeah, I have to move both physically and mentally. Sometimes I can focus too hard which can be detrimental to my design process. Think about the Powers of Ten by Ray and Charles Eames meets a gyroscope.
DL: Oh, we’re getting serious now. What does that mean?
KJ: Scale and perspective. It’s important for me to look at things from all the POVs I can imagine. I attempt to apply that to my design process, as well as my life in general.
DL: What do you think about on your commute?
KJ: My favorite part of what we do here at Clickspring and design in general is the storytelling. So during my commute I like to put in my headphones and zone out while listening to podcasts. I have about ten shows on my regular rotation.
DL: What kind of things do you listen to? Give me your favorites.
KJ: Hmmm…What I gravitate to depends on my mood. 99% Invisible, Voices of VR, Ted Talks, Beautiful Anonymous, 2 Dope Queens…
DL: Okay, your turn.
KJ: Alright, I’ve been saving this one. This is more of a challenge than a question. I know how you like to be challenged. (Clears throat dramatically) Donna, please explain “Clickspring Orange” to a blind person.
DL: (covers eyes with hands) It’s warm…super bright… It’s a happy color… It tastes like orange. Okay, same question to you.
KJ: (laughs) Fair. I’ll expand on what you said. This particular orange is like…pointing your face directly at the sun at high noon on a summer’s day while peeling an actual orange as you sprawl out in the grass at a park while a breeze rustles the leaves in the distance: warm, invigorating, and refreshing.
DL: Oh my…
KJ: Right? It’s like that.
(Scene)
Summer weather is finally arriving on the east coast, but we had an early chance to enjoy the warmth in California with our recent Santa Monica Pier activation for Turner’s Bleacher Report All-Star Weekend event. The tone blended a hip, street ball scene with the playfulness of an LA beach, and focused foremost on personal expression and creativity. Visitors were able to shift between ‘observer’ or ‘participant’ at will, as stages and a basketball court for performances, demonstrations, musical acts, DJ sets, and various sponsored fan zones filled the activated pier. The BR/LA event weekend allowed over 3000 fans to interact with 76 NBA players and saw even more wide-spread engagement online, all leading to increased buzz ahead of the NBA All-Star game.
Clickspring Design, an experiential design firm with offices in New York and Austin, further expanded its commitment to the Chinese market with the launch of a dedicated Mandarin-language website.
“We started working in the Chinese market about six years ago,” notes Erik Ulfers, the firm’s founder and president, “I think it was clear from day one that China is a very unique environment to work in.”
In those six short years, Clickspring Design has completed projects in China for news broadcasters including CCTV, Suzhou TV, Shandong Television, and Jiangsu Broadcasting Corporation.
As well, Clickspring recently worked with Tencent to relaunch the network’s NBA coverage, a project which won multiple Set of the Year honors for broadcast design and augmented reality integration earlier this year.
“The market is very sophisticated in terms of technology, and Chinese broadcasters are looking to further professionalize and modernize their broadcast practice to eventually be leaders of the broadcast market. They’re looking towards our insights and knowledge of design to help do that,” added Ulfers.
Clickspring Design is also focused on branded and consumer environments in China, translating their unique expertise in broadcast to conceptual spaces for brands and businesses with strong architectural vocabulary and relevance.
“Our website underlines the fact that we’re a multidisciplinary firm and have a lot of staff with diverse international connections, bringing these different backgrounds to each project. We have an energetic design culture that wants to be shared with our Chinese clients and advocates,” said Ulfers.
The Chinese-focused website for Clickspring Design was launched around the auspicious occasion of the Chinese New Year and includes a firm overview, team biographies, recent projects and case studies.
The new website is available online at: http://cn.clickspringdesign.com
Clickspring Design（点击春天创意设计公司）是一家在广播电视领域有着丰富经验的设计公司，在纽约和奥斯汀均设有办事处。为了更好地服务于国内用户并开拓中国市场，我们特别推出了中文版网站。
“我们大约从六年前开始为中国市场提供设计工作，”公司创始人兼总裁Erik Ulfers（埃里克·乌尔弗斯）回忆道，“从第一天起，我们就意识到中国市场有着其独特性，充满了挑战。”
在短短的六年时间里，点击春天为中国中央电视台、苏州电视台、山东广播电视台、江苏省广播电视总台（集团）等广播电视单位完成了演播室项目。
与此同时，点击春天最近与腾讯控股有限公司合作，重新设计了腾讯NBA演播室。该项目于今年早些时候赢得了由美国NewcastStudio评选的“最佳体育演播室”及“最佳AR技术应用”两项年度大奖。
“在技术方面，市场已经非常成熟，中国的广播电视机构希望使其广播电视业务进一步专业化和现代化，并最终成为行业的领导者。他们希望借助点击春天的洞察力和设计知识来帮助他们实现这一目标。”Ulfers补充道。
除广播电视演播室及办公区域设计外，点击春天还专注于中国的消费者与企业品牌推广环境设计，通过建筑语言将其独特的视角应用在品牌和企业的概念空间设计上。
“点击春天是一家多元化的公司，拥有众多的员工和多样的国际关系，为每个项目带来不同的背景体验。我们拥有充满活力的设计文化，希望与我们的中国客户和倡导者分享。 ”Ulfers说。
2018年新春佳节，Clickspring Design的中文网站正式上线，其内容主要包括：公司概况、团队介绍、近期项目和案例研究，希望借此使更多国内广电从业者了解我们。
欢迎访问我们的中文网站： http://cn.clickspringdesign.com
We’re thrilled to have won five NewscastStudio 2017 Set of the Year Awards for our work with NBC News, ESPN, SZTV, and Tencent! Clickspring took home top honors in both the National and International categories, as well as Sports, Set Technology (National), and Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality. We couldn’t be happier to celebrate these great collaborations with our partners and clients, and we look forward to many more years of great broadcast design and fabrication yet to come! Click on an image below to view the project’s portfolio.
NBC Nightly News | National Winner | NewscastStudio 2017 Set of the Year
ESPN Studio Z | Set Technology National Winner | NewscastStudio 2017 Set of the Year
SZTV (苏州电视台) | International Winner | NewscastStudio 2017 Set of the Year
Tencent NBA (腾讯控股有限公司) |
Sports Winner & AR/VR Winner | NewscastStudio 2017 Set of the Year
Go grab the latest issue of Design:Retail magazine, where our work for Jack Daniel’s received a beautiful write-up and cover feature! The narrative and photos offer project, process, and design insights surrounding the Motlow House, Barrel House 1-14, and White Rabbit Bottle Shop. Again, kudos to a wonderful client and project team!
And if you prefer pixels over print, check out the online version of the article!
Historically the discipline of broadcast design has been relegated to a more subjective mode of fashion, where personal preference and intuitive solutions have been predominant — a dysfunctional attitude and approach, supported by vast amounts of design work. But like the marketing world, there are new realities for the broadcast world. Proliferation within the competitive marketplace has significantly changed the environment. Both local and national broadcasters must contend with a thoroughly internationalized consumer who self-navigates to get the information they want, when they want it, on multiple distribution formats (mobile, streaming, etc) — all over the world.
We have entered a post-television era where once-autonomous disciplines of communication are converging and augmenting each other to satisfy a more individualized audience appetite. The consumer audience has long since taken control: empowered through technology, the audience is increasingly defining their preferences — redefining the channels and outlets from which they draw their news and information. They are deciding how, when, and where they will interact with your brand, and for how long. Most importantly, they are deciding who they will engage with in an internationalized marketplace.
The audience demands:
This is the emerging landscape of the broadcast industry — pointing not to the development of “Broadcast Channels” but more to the evolution of “Media Brands.” To answer the call for creating an audience-relevant “Media Brand,” organizations must understand the intended role of design as one of strategic partnership — not one of creative fancy, hubris, or even intuition.
In turn, it is now incumbent upon designers to implement creative practices that extend far beyond defining the aesthetics of look and feel. Form follows content — demanding that design solutions present more than just appearance. Here, please remember the distinction between giving form and assembling a collection of forms into a more profound meaning — the unique attributes of each brand, in each geography, must be extended in an architectural vocabulary that is both instantly recognizable as the brand’s own and relevant to the audience. The solution needs to support and reinforce on-air content delivery — on all consumer devices.
Therefore, the same strategies typically more recognized in a marketing context apply for effective differentiation within the marketplace. A successful “Media Brand” must now also seek to strategically assemble individual points of audience interest and interaction into a media offering that provides more touch‐points, deeper meaning, and relevance, all of which will yield an enhanced consumer experience.
Our Tencent NBA client produced a slick reel celebrating the debut of their new Beijing studio! It features a time-lapse of the set install, clips of initial camera blocking, examples of Tencent’s impressive AR capabilites, and even a quick interview with our Fearless Leader, Erik Ulfers.
