The Western Red Cedar Lumber Association (WRCLA) is a Vancouver based non-profit association representing 27 quality producers of Western Red Cedar lumber products in British Columbia, Washington, Oregon and Idaho. Over the years the WRCLA has strived to make its cedar as user friendly as possible by producing quality products to uniform standards and by providing the construction industry with the information it needs on WRCLA cedar products, their specification and proper use.
CHALLENGE:
To reach, engage and ultimately persuade architects, builders and design professionals of the benefits of using western red cedar as a finishing material on their homes. The project included a series of yearly print books that showcased projects using Western Red Cedar around the world. Each featured project required to present a story that tied the use of the material with a major architectural interest. Western red cedar is an extremely versatile species and has a wide range of looks. As such the best way to convey its beauty was to use high impact visuals that showed of its features. The Cedar Book is a yearly publication from the Association and some of the book series occurring features were required to keep as part of the content of the book.
SOLUTION:
The Cedar Book 8 presented its content weaving the human side of the living environments and their users with the technical specifications of each architectural project as its main storytelling touchpoint. This allowed the book to have a less technical look as previous iterations whilst keeping all elements from previous volumes that were focus on product specifications. It was a design decision to keep the size and layout similar to the previous volumes so the users could identify them in their personal libraries. The layout and design allows the images to be the main actors and that helps showcase the use of cedar as well as to how it makes each architectural project highlight its natural beauty, natural advantages and sustainable characteristics.
