Becoming grounded means putting down roots.

In late 2015, 45 brand new townhomes were being built on the Brookland Arts Walk in Northeast DC. Workhorse worked with The Bozzuto Group to create the campaign that introduced them to the neighborhood. The brief was placemaking before product. The neighborhood had its own story to tell first, and the new homes would only land if the campaign read as Brookland-first rather than developer-first.

01Badge

A stamp badge, sized for any surface.

The badge does double duty. Over a photograph, on signage or a mailer or the Metro image, it reads as a postmark; on a plain printed page it reads as a stamp from the sales office. A heart sits at the top, then "GROUNDED" on one line and "IN BROOKLAND" on the next, framed by a rule and set in tall narrow capitals. Because it had to hold its proportions at six feet and at fridge-magnet size, everything else in the campaign followed from that one requirement.

02Pillars

Brookland record store interior, vinyl shelves blurred at depth, with "Grounded in Culture" set in compressed sans white over the photograph

Religious procession with three nuns in habit moving through a busy diverse DC crowd, with "Grounded in History" set in compressed sans white over the photograph

Hands rolling dice in an outdoor backgammon game on a felt board laid on the grass, with "Grounded in Community" set in compressed sans white over the photograph

One line, three substitutions.

The whole campaign turns on swapping one word: "Grounded in Community," "Grounded in Culture," "Grounded in History." Each version sits on a photograph made in Brookland, an outdoor backgammon game on the grass, the local record store, a religious procession moving through a DC crowd, and each one carries the same darkening layer, the same badge, and the same coral rule under the pillar word.

The line also works away from the artwork, which is the part that outlasts the launch. Bozzuto can open the next building, and the one after that, from the same starting position without paying to have the idea made again.

03In place

Brookland pin-board takeaway card with the badge mark and pillar headline

Brookland pin-board takeaway card variant with the badge mark and a secondary tagline

Brookland neighborhood texture photograph, an architectural detail of the new townhomes

04In market

The pillars went to press.

The buy put the campaign across the city: full-page Grounded in Culture ads in the Washington City Paper and the Washington Blade, banner sets on washingtonpost.com and PoPville, and a six-foot sign on the site itself selling the neighborhood before the building. Every placement carried the same badge and the same coral rule under the same offer, new 3 and 4 bedroom townhomes two blocks from the Red Line.

Grounded in Culture full-page ad in the Washington City Paper

Grounded in Culture full-page ad in the Washington Blade

Six-foot Grounded in Brookland site signage

Grounded in Brookland digital banner for PoPville

A neighborhood, then a building.

Bozzuto sells homes by selling neighborhoods, and the Brookland campaign handed the sales office, the brokers, and the buyers an argument they could carry into the room. Everyone led with the Arts Walk, the record store, the procession on the sidewalk. The Gallery Townhomes came second, in a place the buyer had already been sold on.

/ The System