Next Level Baking

December 10, 2020

Next Level Baking

Grain Craft 2020 Ad Campaign

Widgets & Stone created a fresh look for the new Grain Craft ad campaign from late 2018 through 2019. The ads used the contrast of bright whites and colors against dark backgrounds to showcase the company’s many flours (as well as the products that the flours make). Along with presenting the products beautifully, the ads also stood out from the competition.

For the 2020 campaign the ads continued in a same vein, but began to focus more on the variety of products that Grain Craft flours can be part of – as well as to show some of the baking process. Designer Mark Slawson produced strikingly simple ads to communicate Grain Craft’s dedication to excellence.

The ads were translated to a variety of media, including print, digital and social.

Creative Director: Paul Rustand; Design Direction + Design: Mark Slawson; Writing: Jacob Biba; Photography: Dotson Commercial.

Adams Litho Web Design

October 21, 2020

The Best at What We Do

Adams Litho Web Design

Adams Lithographing Company is an international award-winning, third-generation family-owned printing business. They offer a full range of printing services for businesses of every size. From color digital printing to custom UV offset lithographic printing, they consistently deliver the highest quality work, on-time, and on-budget. Their combination of quality craftsmanship and state-of-the-art technical proficiency is grounded in the day-to-day quality that Adams has been producing since 1886.

Adams is long time collaborator with Widgets & Stone, and they asked us to update their web site in 2017 – to simplify the site structure, to improve their messaging and to showcase new capabilities.

In mid-2020, in the midst of repercussions from COVID-19 and subsequent lock downs, Adams decided to invest in improving the site yet again. This time Widgets & Stone helped to refine messaging and photography and to create a showcase video that fit into the already existing site structure.

The final design is an effective sales tool that shows exactly how good Adams Litho is – the best. Visit the site by clicking here.

Creative Direction: Paul Rustand; Design Direction: Liz Tapp; Design: Liz Tapp; Photograhy and video: John Le; Writing: Jacob Biba.

Cognitive Training

February 4, 2016

Cognitive Training

Identity for drug-free, alternative treatment to ADHD

Entrepreneur Chris Wright is using a highly focused form of cognitive therapy to treat ADHD in young adolescents. The new treatment centers will utilize brain mapping technology to identify what parts of the brain are not functioning at potential, then “brain games” and exercises will be employed to improve brain and concentration abilities.

Cognitive therapy and training has been used for decades to improve all types of mental faculties, but Foci is honed in particularly on helping adolescents struggling with ADD and ADHD.

Chris Wright created the business concept and chose the name Foci (the plural form of “focus”). He turned to Widgets & Stone for help in creating a basic identity to capture and communicate the essence of the new brand he and his team are building. The ideas of concentration and focus are at the heart of the visual language the team generated.

Creative Direction: Paul Rustand; Design Direction: Mandy Meredith; Design: Travis Hitchcock; Photography: Dotson Commercial.

Floor Foto

January 13, 2016

Floor Foto

Styles for Mannington Floors

Over the past several years, Widgets & Stone has been working with Mannington Mills (Commercial and Residential flooring) to create all kinds of designs. As part of that work, Design Director Mandy Meredith has been creating photography styles — both settings to show off the floors, and actual floor designs themselves.

Photographers, retouchers, designers and even clients have been essential collaborators in creating a body of work that showcases the new design-forward approach of Mannington.

Creative Direction: Mandy Meredith; Photography: Dotson Commercial; Marta elena Vassilakis; Photo retouching: Dotson Commercial, H2B.

The Art of Engineering

April 1, 2015

AdTech

The Art of Engineering

AdTech (Advanced Technology) Ceramics specializes in engineered, mission-critical ceramics for challenging environments. They deliver on complex challenges that other manufacturers avoid, producing the finest quality ceramics in any industry. Shaping them to be stronger, more durable, more precise than what seems possible.

AdTech has a long and rich history in engineering high performance ceramics, but the company’s market share had declined over time. AdTech’s promotional materials and web site were woefully out of date and did not reflect their high tech capabilities accurately.

Widgets & Stone and 26 Tools worked together to craft new brand communications tools. Along with writing headlines and marketing messaging, the team proposed new graphic treatments and photo styles to reflect AdTech’s expertise.

Dotson Commercial photographed the impossibly small and detailed ceramics that the company makes. In order to capture the extreme precision and beauty of these pieces measuring just inches across, Dotson designed a custom lighting solution and used dark and light reflective services to highlight the materials in isolation. Extensive editing and retouching was required to remove some proprietary elements of the ceramics.

The creative team’s work is now providing the basis of a complete web overhaul being designed and built by Tubatomic.

Creative Direction: Mandy Meredith; Design: Mandy Meredith, Kerry O’Connor; Writing: 26 Tools; Photography: Dotson Commercial.

Escadrille Product Photography

November 20, 2014

Escadrille Product Photos

Photography style for catalog and promotional materials

Dotson Commercial took a basic photographic concept from Paul Rustand and turned it into beautiful images of Escadrille’s products.

Creative Direction: Paul Rustand; Photography: Dotson Commercial.

Style In Store

May 22, 2014

Style In Store

Amtico Custom Design Photo Styling & Ad Design

Creating ads that showcase great products isn’t difficult, but what about when those products don’t yet exist? Showing custom flooring designs to interior designers and architects can be tricky. Led by Design Director Mandy Meredith, the Widgets & Stone team worked hand-in-hand with client Mannington Commercial to design a custom floor pattern for their Amtico Collection.

Mandy and Mannington’s Natalie Jones worked together to not only create a floor pattern, but also to select colors and materials, then to assemble it and create a small section of a sample floor. Widgets & Stone then identified a great retail space to photograph in (Amanda Pinson Jewelry) and a great photographer to composite the floor, Dotson Commercial.

The result is a great example of the client’s custom capabilities, as well as a lovely ad.

Creative Direction: Mandy Meredith; Design: Mandy Meredith, Amy Trumbull; Photography: Dotson Commercial.

Modern Design, for Your Feet

January 10, 2014

Goodhew/Sockwell Web Redesign

The US manufacturers of Goodhew lifestyle socks and Sockwell graduated compression socks have been steadily growing. While their products are well designed and exceptional, their brand communications weren’t reflecting that quality.

They turned to Widgets & Stone and 26 Tools for help with brand communications needs, and specifically for a redesign of their two product web sites. As 26 Tools worked to develop delightful and informative brand messaging, Widgets & Stone worked to develop a library of lifestyle photography and new design styles.

Previous versions of the web sites tended to be heavy on information and light on product imagery.

Widgets & Stone worked with Dotson Studios to create new photography that captured the lifestyle spirit of the brand and showed the product in use.

Then the team developed a clean web design that shows off the wonderful socks and the great lifestyle photography. Web site information was consolidated and the navigation was simplified.

Creative Direction: Paul Rustand; Design Direction: Mandy Meredith; Brand Messaging Strategy & Writing: Caleb Ludwick, 26 Tools; Design: Ben Dicks, Amy Trumbull; Photography: Dotson Studios.

On the Node

September 17, 2013

Brand & Communications Strategy

Variable creates platforms that make the real digital, and make the digital real. Variable is also a leading developer of wireless sensing technology, NODE.

NODE is a Kickstarter success story, turned hardware development company. They are a listening company, a learning company. Experts and innovators. PhDs and MBAs. Users and rethinkers of technology.

NODE’s target market is shifting and expanding, and it is more important than ever that they have a unified and consistent message about who they are, what they do, and why it matters.

Variable’s new CBO Jonathan Bragdon approached the creative partnership of Widgets & Stone, 26 Tools and Tubatomic to help craft a brand and communications strategy for the next phase of the company’s growth.

The team built on the solid identity (created by D+J Brand Consulting) to expand the kit of design and communications tools — with new writing, new photography, a new brand hierarchy and new web tools. Utilizing both broad and narrow strategies: appealing to gadgeteers who can help expand how NODE is used, or to very specific markets in color matching.

“At Variable, we make sensory platforms that connect apps and smart devices to the real world, in new ways.

NODE is a hardware platform, that transforms how apps let us make sense of the world.”

Creative Direction: Paul Rustand, Mandy Meredith; Design: Mandy Meredith, Paul Rustand, Brad Dicharry; Communication Strategy/Writing: Caleb Ludwick; Photography: Grant Dotson; Web Design: Tubatomic.