Golden Gopher Graphics

When management of Minneapolis’ Metrodome indoor arena sought to capture the school’s sports legacy (granted, the Golden Gophers haven’t won a Big Ten football title since 1960, but the hoops squad made the Final Four in 1997 and promises a return to success with Tubby Smith as head coach, and the hockey squad is a fixture in the “Frozen Four”) inside Minneapolis’ Metrodome before last football season, it hired Minneapolis-based Visual Impact and Podium Sports Marketing.

However, because the project required installation directly to concrete walls, the project posed a challenge — the 10-ft.-tall, 120-ft.-long project would be installed directly to a concrete corridor. To fabricate the project, Visual Impact used 3M’s IJ8624 textured-surface, inkjet-printable film with 8524 matte-finish overlaminate, which it output at 370 dpi on its HP Scitex XL Jet. Prior to application, the company prepped the surface with isopropyl alcohol. To install the graphic, two Podium Sports Marketing installers melded the film to the substrate with a 1,100º F heat gun. According to 3M’s Rich Paukert, the material’s durability ranges from approximately on month on rough, unfinished, outdoor substrates to several years on smooth, painted, indoor surfaces such as the Metrodome’s cinder-block walls.

Headwater Creative (Bloomington, MN) developed the content, which featured a timeline and photos of past Gopher greats from all sports.