Part 2 of 4
By Melissa Donovan
In the first part of this series we profiled the first place winner of this year’s Application of the Year awards, Art City Wraps of Oshkosh, WI. The company was nominated for its work printing and installing 20 different exterior wall murals for the Oshkosh Mini Mural Project.
The second place winner’s application remains outside but its purpose is slightly different—instead of promoting art and culture, Premier Graphics Inc. of Richmond, BC, Canada, won for its window graphics created for Project Skin MD.
Skincare Signage
Premier Graphics begin in 1992 and the company was incorporated in 2006. It works out of one 4,200 square foot location in Richmond, serving all of North America. The company specializes in print, supply, and application of vinyl products for application to vehicles, windows, walls, floors, and ceilings—both indoors and outdoors.
Project Skin MD has been a customer of Premier Graphics for the last ten years. This particular job involved beautifying its skincare facility in South Granville, Vancouver with classy, sophisticated window graphics. The print service provider (PSP) decided to use Drytac’s ViziPrint Impress Clear.
ViziPrint Impress Clear is an optically clear PET film, PVC-free, 100 percent recyclable, and resistant to both wear and tear and water. It is designed for trouble-free, dry or wet installation of graphics on glass surfaces and other smooth surfaces. The film eliminates bubbling and is unaffected by moisture. Drytac’s proprietary suction technology ensures that ViziPrint Impress Clear can be removed without leaving residue behind. The versatile film can also be reverse printed and does not stretch.
Printed on using white ink and a Konica Minolta AccurioWide hybrid UV LED wide format printer, the printer is equipped with UV LED lamps that allow for printing on a wider range of media—while simultaneously saving energy, time, and costs.
The media was installed using a wet application solution. According to Jordan Sorley, operations manager, Premier Graphics, a challenge associated with the job was installing the graphics in cold temperatures of around ten degrees Celsius, however Drytac ViziPrint Impress Clear held up. Despite this, the time from job submittal to install only took one week.
“This was a relatively cold weather install, only about six or seven degrees Celsius, but the ViziPrint Impress Clear worked very well. It is a strong and stiff PET material that doesn’t stretch, which was a huge benefit when aligning panels with a detailed design,” says Sorley.
Another advantage to the material, it is easily removable—so when Project Skin MD is ready to switch its window graphics, it will come off easily. A third advantage, the film is PVC-free, making it an environmentally friendly choice.
Peer Recognition
When questioned why this project drew so much interest from peers in the Application of the Year awards, Sorley notes “we believe it not only provided an element of privacy, but also it helped to beautify the neighborhood despite the winter weather.”
The PSP’s work for Project Skin MD is great example of savvy and sophisticated graphics for storefronts—installable in any weather or climate. Continue reading about exterior graphics in the next part of this series, which recalls Sport Graphics’ work for the NCAA Final Four—a superwide graphic installed on a prominent hotel building in downtown Indianapolis, IN.
Aug2021, Digital Output
