BRAND EXPERIENCE DESIGN | NARRATIVE CASE STUDY

Design briefs can be underwhelming.

Design the circulation space and common area leading to four showrooms and conference room at Nike’s Canada HQ, Toronto. …newly opened workspace features flexible work areas, a community hub, focus rooms, conference rooms and open seating areas to accommodate… You get the picture.

Design a hallway. Easy enough?

The point of a showroom is obviously to get buyers excited about upcoming products, to purchase and sell in Dicks or Nordstrom, or Footlocker, or wherever.

Opposing Demands

With any Nike project, design expectations are high.

This space needed to feel athletic, confident, full of history, and connected to the kind of work you could walk out the door and see throughout the Nike World Headquarters campus in Beaverton.

So on one hand, it needed to kick-ass, that was the baseline expectation. On the other hand, what was in the showrooms was the point. The space outside them could build anticipation, but it could not be tied too closely to one product, color, season, or sport.

So my briefer-brief became Keep it neutral, but make it kick ass. I wrote it on a sticky note and stuck it to my truck’s dash so I could revisit it before and after work.

The tension between the two opposing demands made it interesting.

I had an idea for the neutral part. Making it kick ass wouldn’t come from the hallway itself; it needed to elicit an elevated feeling that the buyer took with them into the showroom. That was the opportunity: less about telling the brand story, more about inviting the showroom goer in—which meant the hook needed to be something they discovered through normal use.

Some are rushing. Some are waiting. Some pay attention to every detail and notice what’s out of place. Others walk past something a hundred times before they suddenly notice it.

Did they just put that up?

People move through the same spaces every day, but never in the same way. No one person experiences the same experience the same, twice.

You are here

Greeted by an oversized Nike Futura graphic—white and gray, spilling from wall to wall to glass in the lobby—an appropriate amount of “wow” for this space. Striking a balance between heritage and functionality— it celebrates the brand in clean timeless design, rooted in the visual language of the iconic Cortez outsole.

The setup

Gazing down the hall to the right: lots of white, raw concrete, and a huge black number 23.

Across from that, a wall of logos arranged in a grid runs down the opposite wall.

Moving into the corridor, Steve Prefontaine’s ghost registers at the far end.

The whole story is laid out.

Layers of discovery

The giant black 23 on the left is larger than it looks, overwhelming the architecture, as if the building itself were the afterthought.

From 25 feet you read MICHAEL JORDAN, the name of the showroom set in Trade Gothic Bold Condensed, black against the gray wall.

A step or two later and the gray paint looks weird below MICHAEL JORDAN just next to the door handle you are eyeing to grab.

As you reach for the handle, the invisible story appears through the shift in sheen below his name:

THE GREATEST BASKETBALL PLAYER OF ALL TIME

It was there the whole time.

There is no button. Nothing moves. You do not have to know where to stand. Moving toward and through the doorway makes the rest of the story visible—alive.

Am I the only one who sees this?

The sequence is not stated but discovered—a discovery intended to give a person pause in their moment of recognition.

Nothing is forced or overexplained. It teaches through realization.

Once you catch it, you can’t help but pay attention.

But wait, there’s more.

Logos

Remember the logo grid wall on the right as seen from the entryway?

It is a pretty standard Nike move that feels especially right in a showroom. And at first, that is exactly what it is. The logos work as a pattern and a reminder of products and advertising that has entertained inspired us.

The big Nike logo in the lobby declares the space when you walk in.

Scaled down, the grid of logos becomes something you can look through.

And then the logos disappear inside a larger image.

As you walk deeper into the space, the mural of Steve Prefontaine begins to look a little bit off.

From down the hall, it is a portrait.

Then the image starts to loosen.

“Is that…? No. Those - are - not - logos”, said one of the painters, “They are!”

Connection made. Bang! As a designer, these are the moments that I live for.

First you understand the logos as individual stories. Then those stories come together to form someone who helped shape the larger one.

Everything in the space is subtly related. Everything works on its own. But everything finds a way to connect to other elements in proximity.

And because you make the connection yourself, it’s yours.

Something people live with

The Toronto showroom is a workspace, part of Nike’s Canada HQ in Toronto.

People don't just pass through once. They work there.

On the way to a meeting. Eating lunch. Waiting for someone. With a visitor through. Walked the same space while paying attention to completely different things.

Near the break area, another story sits quietly on the wall:

ALWAYS LISTEN TO THE VOICE OF THE ATHLETE

Connection made. Bang! As a designer, these are the moments that I live for.

First you understand the logos as individual stories. Then those stories come together to form someone who helped shape the larger one.

Everything in the space is subtly related. Everything works on its own. But everything finds a way to connect to other elements in proximity.

And because you make the connection yourself, it’s yours.

Something people live with

Workspace in use

The Toronto showroom is a workspace, part of Nike’s Canada HQ in Toronto.

People don't just pass through once. They work there.

On the way to a meeting. Eating lunch. Waiting for someone. With a visitor through. Walked the same space while paying attention to completely different things.

Near the break area, another story sits quietly on the wall:

ALWAYS LISTEN TO THE VOICE OF THE ATHLETE

Always listen to the voice of the athlete / sheen-shift

From one position, it is barely there. Move through the space and the light finds it.

Somebody might notice it immediately.

Somebody else might walk past it a hundred times.

Then one day:

Did they just put that up?

Maybe someone who already knows points it out.

Stand over here.

Look.

The discovery is no longer only between a person and the space.

It becomes a shared lived experience.

One person notices the quote. Someone else recognizes an old logo. Someone realizes what the Steve Prefontaine image is made from. Someone shows the invisible line under Michael Jordan’s name to a visitor.

Multiple chances to have a different experience, multiple chances to discover something.

And multiple chances to connect through that discovery along.

The space becomes a designed ecosystem of discovery.

Not because everything is changing.

The environment does not need to change to feel different, because the person experiencing it does.

Three legends and a legendary field

The number, then the name, then the story, then you enter.

The structure stays the same. The story changes. The feeling never gets old.

This is one of many projects I had the pleasure to work with Chuck Eichten, always a professional, always insightful, always very busy. He knows how much to give a designer and how much to leave to their discovery.

Project: Nike / WD+C / Canada HQ,
Senior Experience Designer: Gus Nicklos
Brand Design Director: Chuck Eichten
Workplace Designer: Lois MacKenzie