In 2003, Lucky Strike Entertainment struck gold when they launched their first Lucky Strike Bowling location in Hollywood, which trendily mixed modern nightclub sensibilities with bowling alleys to create a hip, happening hangout.
Now some fifteen years later and numerous other locations around the country, Lucky Strike was ready for their next ventures.
FTW Chicago is a custom, one-of-a-kind indoor mini-golf course intertwined with an indoor arcade and a modern Chicago-themed restaurant with “neon-vintage” bar and grille cuisines.
Meanwhile Lucky Strike Social in Albany, New York combines Lucky Strike bowling facilities with FTW arcade games and a live music venue.
When Lucky Strike owners needed custom signage for these new locales, one sign shop in Northwest Indiana put up the high score here by designing, constructing, and installing a variety of signs used throughout the facilities.
For the past eight months, Landmark Sign Group of Chesterton, Indiana has been providing distinctive signage for these new Lucky Strike locations. The sign company first became involved with Lucky Strike Entertainment by servicing their signage and neon at their bowling location in downtown Chicago.
It’s been quite the journey for this group of sign makers. Owner Al O’Brien started Landmark Sign Group back in 1983, first operating out of a two-car garage.
From these humble beginnings, the company has grown to become the largest custom sign company in the Chicago and Northwest Indiana areas creating “landmark” signage and has even advanced to taking on national account work.
Today Landmark Sign Group operates out of a 30,000-square-foot facility that includes full metal and plex fabrication, an AXYZ 10-by-22-foot dual-head CNC router, a custom-built 950-square-foot down-draft spray booth with baking technology, and a team of professionals who have over 500 years of accumulated experience in sign manufacturing.
They also offer expert sign installation and service for their products, as well as sub-contracted signs. They possess a fleet of cranes, bucket trucks, and aerial equipment and have even had to use helicopters for installation of signage atop buildings dotting the Chicago skyline.
“Perhaps one of our greatest strengths is our delivery time,” says O’Brien.
This concept of being a custom sign company that could produce the quickest turnarounds was borne out of part planning and part necessity.
O’Brien explains that, during the early days back in his garage, they had to make certain their vendors and employees were paid on time. “Successfully doing this meant that our clients knew they could rely on us to meet any deadline thrown at us,” he says. “[We can] make the boldest guarantee in the industry: When we promise to deliver, it’s on time or on us!”
When Lucky Strike developed their FTW (“For the Win”) concept, officials told them that they were looking for unique signage with a “steampunk” theme at these locations in Chicago and Albany, New York. (Note: Steampunk incorporates technology and aesthetic designs inspired by nineteenth century industrial steam-powered machinery as an alternative sci-fi/fantasy history.)
Lucky Strike sent the sign company a few rough sketches of what they had in mind, and Art Director Jerry Lefere and Head Technical Engineer Terry Ambrosini designed preliminary drawings for sixteen interior signs and four exterior and directional signs. The two then met with FTW Chicago Owner Steven Foster for a walk-through of the facility.
At this meeting, Lefere and Ambrosini brought a sample of one of the design elements, a 3D-routed foam gear painted to look like a real metal gear.
Foster was so impressed with how realistic the gear looked (as well as the other prepared designs), he immediately gave the go-ahead to move into pre-production planning. This included taking their logo elements and complementing them with high-resolution graphics, producing full shop and engineering drawings, and showing construction and installation methods.
Careful consideration was given to color, lighting, and materials to make sure that everything exceeded expectations.
Landmark Sign Group sent Controller Shaun Ensign out to do a preliminary survey of each site—taking photos and measurements, going over issues like mounting methods and electrical access, etc.
“We do a pre-installation survey to make sure that what we have designed and engineered will still work after the build-out has been completed,” says Lefere.
Here is a closer look at the signs Landmark Sign Group came up with for the new Lucky Strike FTW and Social locations.
FTW Chicago: Main Entrance Sign. This was an important sign to get right, as it was the one being installed onto a granite wall at the entrance to the flagship FTW Chicago. Landmark Sign Group spent a great deal of extra time making sure this sign would be just as impressive as the interior environment.
“We created a multi-layered sign using elements of their logo,” says Lefere.
Sign construction started with a 1/8-inch aluminum, CNC-routed gear reverse-illuminated with LED cove lighting.
At the center of the sign is a four-inch-deep aluminum cabinet with a translucent Lexan® face and a translucent digital print applied to the face. The face also includes 3/4-inch acrylic push-thru copy and stars for more dimension.
At the top and bottom of the center cabinet are 1/2-inch acrylic flat cut outs with digital prints on the faces.
On top of the flat cut outs, Landmark Sign Group added 1/2-inch acrylic stars and copy with embedded amber LEDs that generate a halo effect on the graphic.
FTW Chicago: Reload Sign. This was another important sign, as it identifies the spot where patrons can go to purchase more points for their game cards; so it had to be visible throughout the entire gaming floor.
The Reload sign consists of an aluminum background that is covered with velvet wallpaper that the FTW Chicago had purchased overseas.
Landmark Sign Group then attached 3D gears that they CNC-routed out of two-inch-deep high-density foam and painted with a distressed look.
They attached amber LEDs behind the gears, which created a gold halo on the wallpaper.
“We then fabricated letters with incandescent bulbs inside of them,” says Lefere, noting that the owners were, once again, “blown away” by the look.
FTW Chicago: Wheels of Wonder Sign. There are a few one-of-a-kind games inside the arcade, such as Wheels of Wonder, an over-sized slot machine where people can win tickets for prizes.
L
andmark Sign Group fabricated a 16-by-5-foot aluminum backer frame and wrapped it in an industrial-looking digital print. They then fabricated front- and reverse-illuminated channel letters and mounted them to the face.
They hung the finished sign from ceiling beams using aircraft cable.
FTW Chicago: Mini-Golf Sign. FTW Chicago also needed a map of the layout at their six-hole indoor mini-golf course. The challenge was making a four-by-eight-foot sign with a thin, low profile.
The sign company ended up using one-inch milk white acrylic for the diffuser so they could make the cabinet profile at two inches deep.
“We applied a translucent digital print to the face of the acrylic and filled the cabinet with bright-white LEDs,” says Lefere. “This is by far the brightest sign in the place—so bright that we had to add a layer of translucent white vinyl to help diffuse it even more.”
Landmark Sign Group also built a custom-illuminated shelf under the sign for people to set their drinks on while studying the map. The shelf has embedded ribbon LEDs with a digitally printed polycarbonate top and a scratch-proof laminate.
FTW Chicago: Restroom Signage. Landmark Sign Group combined visibility with the desired steampunk theme for directional restroom signage hanging throughout the venue.
They fabricated a 2-foot, 6-inch-by-5-foot cabinet with push-thru icons illuminated internally with LEDs.
They then fabricated a hanging bracket out of galvanized pipe that is suspended from the ceiling beams with aircraft cable.
Lucky Strike Social: Entrance & Hanging Signs. The Albany, New York location is located inside a mall and is the first Lucky Strike Social-branded site.
The Lucky Strike Entertainment design team sent Lefere and Ambrosini preliminary graphics depicting the desired look for these locations; they not only had to design signage around the provided theme but also within the guidelines of the mall management.
Landmark Sign Group worked with the provided logo designs to create a six-by-nine-foot, eight-inch-deep illuminated cabinet mounted above the entrance.
Along with backlighting a Lexan face with a translucent digital print, the sign company attached one-inch acrylic copy to the face to give it more dimension.
“We gave the sign a four-inch retainer so that we could line the outside of the sign with 10-watt incandescent bulbs to give it an old-style marquee feel,” says Lefere.
Lucky Strike Social: Arcade Sign. Landmark Sign Group produced a wide variety of signage inside the facility including a ceiling-mounted double-face sign that leads into the arcade. This was created by fabricating a large cabinet in the center that features trimcap faces with translucent digital prints. It is internally illuminated with LEDs.
“We created a surround for the cabinet out of four-inch-deep high density foam in the shape of a large gear,” says Lefere.
The sign was installed from the ceiling with two-inch aluminum tubing.
Landmark Sign Group is in current production for FTW Denver in Colorado and Lucky Strike Bethesda in Maryland. They are also involved in early design work for locations in Honolulu, Hawaii and Boston, Massachusetts.
By Jeff Wooten
All photos: Landmark Sign Group.
