Bethany provides a suitable name for a Christian endeavor: In Biblical times, it was the name of a town near Jerusalem, and the birthplace of Lazarus and Mary Magdalene. The namesake Australian Christian college (abroad, “college” refers to secondary schools; Bethany educates 7th to 12th-grade students) wished to infuse tradition with a lively new sign package to celebrate a move into a new building on its Paralowie campus. The school hired PB Visual Communications (Norwood, SA, Australia), which it has previously contracted for sign work, to develop a vibrantly colored wall sign.
Paul Montesi, PB Visual’s general manager, said, “They wanted some-thing unique to reflect the school’s philosophy and present the sign as an integral building component.”
Montesi designed the concept from scratch using CorelDRAW® 15, and developed a vibrant color palette that will certainly gain curb appeal for the school. The sign comprises a series of interlocking, acrylic lightboxes secured to the wall with approximately 3-in.-wide, metal standoffs. He said positioning the standoffs to provide attractive reveals, while providing suitable support for the lightboxes, posed a significant obstacle. PB Visual installed them with Hilti lag bolts, and painted them black for effect.
To illuminate the 50-sq.-ft. sign, Montesi selected LEDs because of their ease of installation and energy-cost savings. To optimize brightness within the sign’s geometric configuration, he chose Lumi Micro three-bulb, 6,500K, rectangular modules.
PB Visual subcontracted the acrylic boxes’ fabrication; the vendor built them using a MultiCam 3000 CNC router. They were subsequently stacked as squares and rectangles on the wall. To decorate the faces, the shop used Avery Graphics’ 700 Series translucent vinyl, which it cut on its Graphtec CE 5000 plotter, and installed as a single surface within the boxes. The signs’ various curved designs were also devised as cut, single-surface graphics.
PB Visual installed the panels on the wall with a 0.4-in.-thick backing layer of 3A Composite’s Forex® rigid-sheet media. To install the signs, PB Visual’s Andrew Smith and Geoff Maudlin hammer-drilled into the wall while working on a JLG scissor lift.