Aim High: Air Force Academy Athletics

Latitude Signage serves the Air Force Academy athletics department with custom branding solutions.

Only a select few have what it takes to be an Air Force Academy cadet. To recruit the best of the best, the Air Force Academy athletics department wanted to overhaul the look of their football and basketball team areas. Nestled in the foothills in Colorado Springs is their sprawling campus, built in the late 1950’s following the modernism movement, the campus is a tourist destination. Gone are the plain cement block walls that once welcomed athletes to meeting room facilities. Now those walls are adorned with large print custom graphics and illuminated Air Force Academy logos.

BIG WIN

The most exciting features in the signage package are the dramatic oversized images. They are digitally printed images that are transferred on to fabric using dye sublimation. With a silicone edge, the fabric easily snaps into a frame, making it a lightweight solution for the wall that’s also easy to update in the future. The images also act as identifiers to distinguish the football and the men’s and women’s basketball areas from one another.

"We’re are always trying to recruit more athletes to come here. So going from stark white walls to pretty graphics definitely helped increase our pride. Rather than walking around barren hallways with pictures from the 1970s, we’re now more in the 21st century," says Major Becky Bucher, Facilities Operations Air Force Academy.

As a football recruiting tool, the new signage tells a story of success for former athletes. There is a wall dedicated to how many All-Americans they’ve had and another wall dedicated to players who’ve gone on to play in the NFL. For the Air Force Academy staff, those stat walls are modular and easy to update in the future.

TEAM EFFORT

A designer was commissioned for the interior spaces for the Air Force Academy athletics group. Latitude collaborated with the onsite GC, NEI Construction, to take the designs and make them feasible for construction in the desired spaces. Latitude worked to produce the extra-large fabric pieces. "We went out to the site together to measure and re-measure the spaces. With such large signs, we wanted to make sure we got every detail right," says Justin Halverson, Latitude Business Development Manager.

Custom milled slat walls hold the AF logo and create a dramatic visual effect leading to the large graphics wall. Dimensional letters for the branded signs were produced by Latitude, and they partnered with Image First to create the aluminum lightning bolts that are illuminated with blue LED lights. "The effect is really stunning," Halverson says.

GAME CHANGER

Air Force Academy is a beautiful locale with a dramatic mountainous backdrop. Now the inside of the football and basketball athlete areas are just as exciting. High-impact visuals heighten the experience for students and entice them to become part of the Air Force Academy tradition.

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