A "welcome" alternative to advertising

When you've got about 50,000 cars a day driving by the place you're marketing just on one street alone, why not lay out a welcome mat for those road-weary travelers? That was the idea behind a series of three large, mostly permanent banners we developed for Vulcan Real Estate to tout the sustainable lifestyles and building practices going on in South Lake Union. Other messages on the high-visibility banners include: "Other neighborhoods are just as green. But only with envy." and "Hey, you in the hybrid. We (heart) you." Kudos to DEI for their design efforts.

Missing: Gorgeous, wine-drinking couple

Ads for urban condos are supposed to look a certain way, right? Sure, if you want your ad to look like all the others. That was the problem astutely recognized by Vulcan Real Estate when they asked for some new print ads to promote interest in their Rollin Street Flats project in Seattle's South Lake Union. Our answer: forget the usual visual cliches. In fact, forget the visuals altogether, and create some honest, slightly tongue-in-cheek announcements to the condo-shopping populace. By their absence of hip images, we suspect these ads are hipper still. You can click on the image to read the copy, and you can tip your hat to DEI Design for the art direction.

Sometimes the best ad isn't an ad

After the Swedish Cancer Institute approached us about putting together a plan to mark the 75th year anniversary of the institute, we came back with an advertising-light proposal that stressed building bonds with past and current patients. After all, when you get some very bad news from a doctor do you go searching for newspaper ads about cancer, or do you call your friends and relatives? One of our suggestions was to create these wall panels festooned with ribbons representing each of the 3,000-plus patients the SCI will treat in a year. People have taken to writing their names -- or the names of loved ones -- on the ribbons as a powerful, personal reminder of how widespread this disease has become. A tip of the Worker Bees cap to our partner, Michael Courtney Design, for beautifully handling the environmental design duties.

Please do not adjust your TV set

This ad isn't printed wrong. It's exactly as we intended it. The audience is a few hundred typography and letterpress enthusiasts assembling in Seattle this summer for the 2007 TypeCon conference. If you've ever spent five minutes working with handset wood or lead type (as students of SVC's letterpress classes do all the time), you'll get it in an instant.