From a very early age, Alex King has been interested in machinery and tools. For Alex, this interest is more than just a predilection, it’s in his DNA: Alex got his start making machinery for his father’s company and grew up with a grandfather who worked for Lockheed, the Oakridge US Arsenal, and the CDC.

Fast-forward to 2010: Alex King has been in the manufacturing and fabrication business for over 20 years in the Atlanta area. During this time, the web has become a critical source of information and interaction for society. Despite having nothing in the way of a web presence, Alex has built Precision Fabrication into a successful business through hard work, talent, and satisfied clients. Alex realized that even a business like his, rooted in physical manufacturing, couldn’t continue to grow without approaching the internet as a channel for new business.

Solution

With our feet planted in both the digital and physical realms, People of Resource were uniquely suited to understand the realities of Alex’s business, as well as the challenges of translating his value proposition to the web.

Our first priority was in communicating the breadth and depth of his facilities and project experience. Doing this in a simple, powerful, and visual way was the grounding of this project. The outcome of this initiative is an interactive video piece that directly presents Precision Fabrication’s capabilities to each visitor. This device is supported by a flexible, easy-to-update framework that clearly supplies vital information and allows Precision Fabrication to keep a fresh, current web presence.

Results

Using the visual and captivating language of high-quality video, the website serves initially as an interest-grabbing platform. However, the site is much more than just a pretty face: Alex is continuously adding new work and experience to create a deep, living catalog of his firm’s track record as leaders in their field. This visceral demonstration of their prowess has resulted in the fruition of our goals for this project: increased sales and interest in the company. Alex has reported back to us with a pronounced uptick in business. What’s even more exciting is the fact that the majority of new leads are coming to Precision Fabrication through their new website.

Luckie Food Lounge is the restaurant debut of visionary club entrepreneur Mike Boles, the developer and former owner of Atlanta’s Compound night club. Benefitting from an ideal Centennial Hill location that brings in locals and visitors alike, the enormous eatery features a fantastic world of the latest technology and clever new service industry twists.

While Creative Director at thing farm, David VanArsdale, along with thing farm Designer and Operations Director, David Ringholz, designed and fabricated custom interior furnishings and lighting for the sushi bar area of Luckie. The initial vision for sushi bar seating entailed multiple tables and a continuous overhead box light. This brief, though it accommodated some of the needs of use, failed to answer some of the more exciting questions related to community, privacy, and interaction.

Solution

Understanding the context of the space, the design team approached the volume as a sedate oasis in an otherwise intense dining and entertainment experience. The alternative plan that emerged consisted of a single, unified bamboo table and multiple overhead lighting pieces.

This approach fueled a reconsideration of the entire sushi bar area on the owner’s side and resulted in their request for the design of a flowing bamboo ceiling that interacts with the structural steel used in the building.

With our clients’ approval and full confidence, we produced our proposed twenty-foot bamboo communal dining table along with twenty-nine custom light fixtures.

Each ‘Luckie Blossom’ light pendant was designed, machined, and hand-assembled in-house from aluminum, delrin, and silicone. The pendants actively respond to movements in the space below. As people move beneath the blossoms, they magically open up to welcome and bathe guests in a soft glow produced by halogen bulbs resting in tubes of microscopic glass bubbles.

Results

The resulting sushi-bar area succeeds in allowing the refined, industrial aesthetic of the surrounding restaurant to cross-fade with the organic glow of the massive tropical fish tanks behind the sushi bar.

This project was honored with the 2007 Atlanta Downtown Design Excellence Award for interior space design.