NBA | In-Season Tournament
Making sports history by building buzz for the NBA’s first In-Season Tournament, ever.
To combat their mid-season viewership slump, the NBA created the first-ever In-Season Tournament, complete with playoffs, championship, trophy, the works. The only problem was: how could we reach the casual NBA fans the tournament was designed to excite, who are of course, the exact people tuning out bball news? By showing up in their streams and feeds in ways they were paying attention to — style and culture. And by giving the Tournament the one thing it was missing — a red carpet.
*Gasp*
“ It looks fantastic!”
- Adam Silver, NBA Commissioner
“Nice.”
- Timothee Chalamet, Actor
Results
The Process
A peek behind the scenes at a few of the dozens of mood boards, sketches, and renders it took to get there.
Uniting both the glitzy IST brand and classic basketball nostalgia, we brought the energy and motion of basketball — specifically, a basketball swishing through a net — to life, in runway form.
The Inspiration
The Approaches
We then began translating that spirit into the structure and space.
Each of the three options centered around a single modular design element we could fabricate efficiently and repeatedly, and assemble into a dynamic and dazzling environment.
Approach 1
Approach 2
Approach 3
The Execution
With the NBA’s selection of Approach 1 in hand, we turned it from a cool idea to a buildable structure. No detail too small. Every truss, light, and logo was painstakingly placed, so every paparazzi camera angle would capture a logo and player, and none of the stage dressing.
Role: Creative Director
Art: Graham Kelman, Chrissy Raftery, Barbie Lam, Julia Rettig
Copy: Zach Deluca