“Our overarching idea was looking at sport through the lens of New York City. We’ve highlighted amazing New York sports moments and Nike athletes through graphics, image, illustration, color, typography, and space,” explained Matthew Kneller, Director of North American Communications at Nike.
Description of project by WSDIA | WeShouldDoItAll
Nike is in a New York state of mind upon completion of their new colossal office space in Midtown. WeShouldDoItAll (WSDIA) serves as creatives on environmental graphics.
New York City is raw, never finished, and constantly reinventing itself. Nike is innovation, with an unrelenting drive to exceed expectations and inspire all athletes. So what do New York City and Nike have in common? Both are bold, vibrant and constantly breaking new ground. The connection is now further entrenched with Nike’s East Coast headquarters complete.
The six floor 150,000 square foot space includes a massive indoor basketball court, varied workspaces, a hand-tagged food truck, VIP and workout spaces, a Nike heritage inspired VW van, and a 90-foot long sedum planted Swoosh on the rooftop terrace.
The main directive—architecturally and graphically—was to highlight the synergy between New York City and Nike, by examining sport themed floors through the lens of NYC. The direction is manifested through materials, imagery, illustration, custom typography and space.
Nike’s Workplace Design + Connectivity (WD+C) team partnered with STUDIOS Architecture to complete the architecture, while Michael Spoljaric (Senior Creative Director, Nike Global Basketball) worked closely with long-time collaborators WeShouldDoItAll (WSDIA) and a roster of talents to implement all environmental branding components in the space.
Working closely with Spoljaric for over a year, WSDIA designed the indoor basketball court bleachers, all wayfinding and signage—featuring a custom typeface made exclusively for space—and numerous distinct branding moments.
Notable pieces include: a 30 foot tall bark wall that nods to Nike’s Oregon roots; custom handmade rugs in various spaces, one of which—in the VIP Jeter Lounge—features all Yankees’ championship years; floor patterns derived from court lines and NYC’s bridges spill into the VIP Showrooms; custom running and basketball inspired CNC milled wall tiles; conference room ceiling tiles resembling shoe soles; a Michael Jordan mosaic tile wall; custom perforated locker patterns; and the art direction and curation of all illustration and photography for meeting booths.
