A lot of offices don’t look like they’ve updated their decor since the early ’90s—motivational posters and plastic plants, anyone? But when Oracle decided to makeover a space in their Seattle office, they knew they wanted artwork that would be fun, unique and usable that would inspire their creative group of employees. Susan Blackman, President of Art Advisory, Ltd., was brought in by Oracle to design the piece. They wondered if she could take a common tool for brainstorming, the white board, and make it exciting.
“Oracle asked ‘Can you do a dry erase board?’,” said Blackman. “And I said ‘Sure, I never say no.’ But then I immediately reached out to Vice President of ER2 Image Group, Alan Schellerer, to make sure it really was possible!”
The vision was to cover an area of 7′ x 60′ with a dry erase surface that would also include five large panels of vector illustrations. Until recently, the only option would have been to use dry erase laminate, which over time shows signs of “ghosting” from marker use and begins to no longer look white. ER2 instead used a recent innovation called EZ EraseTM, a dry erase vinyl film that creates a great writing surface while also allowing for exceptional printing on top of it, without the need for a laminate. The end result was a massive white board with slick illustrations perfectly integrated and ready to be doodled over.
“We were able to partner Susan’s artistic vision with Alan Hinkhouse’s design experience to create a memorable piece of useable artwork,” said Alan Schellerer, Vice President at ER2. “We were also able to provide Susan with the contact of a trusted installer in Seattle.”
The project came out so well that there are now plans to create similar installations in their other offices too.
“It was super fast, really a seamless process,” said Blackman. “ER2 made it easy.”
