​Since it welcomed its first residents in 1991, Kendal at Hanover, a continuing care retirement community, has called on CGD to provide imaginative, comprehensive, and well crafted solutions to its identity and wayfinding needs.

Most recently, Kendal requested that the materials palette of its original, artisan-carved building identification signs be updated in order to reduce the frequency of maintenance typical of even the finest exterior painted wood signs. The Client agreed with the Designer’s recommendation that this improvement should also include the redesign and fabrication of all its campus signage, including parking lot makers and vehicle regulatory sings previously provided by Kendal’s Maintenance Department.

At every stage, the project benefitted from intensive collaborations between the Designer, fabricator, and key personnel drawn from all levels of the Client’s administration. In keeping with tradition at Kendal, further input was provided by the project team’s two visually astute residents, and later, by a 30-member liaison/landscape resident committee.

In addition to providing the Client with the reduced maintenance of painted aluminum components, CGD ensured that the new sign program would function as an extension of Kendal’s historically-informed architecture through its color palette, font choices, border details, and traditional post-and-panel design.