Design Army’s Invasion

Interior designers and architects can craft the most beautiful buildings and spaces, but speaking as a magazine editor, they’re no good in print unless the photographs and accompanying text are arranged perfectly on the page.

In that respect, Design Army has invaded DC, creating illustrations, layouts, and photo shoots to make the names and pictures of their client companies sing.

I took one look at some of their layouts, and was blown away. Check out Wonderland, the commemorative book they did for Septime Webre and the Washington Ballet, going to venues all over Washington to illustrate Septime’s favorite ballets, and unifying the portraits with text from Alice in Wonderland.

Septime poses as a Mad Hatter on a platform built behind the clock in the old Wonder Bread factory in DC's Shaw. The factory had been turned into a repository for old bikes, so Design Army's crew ripped them apart and used them for the shoot. The text mirrors the shape of the clock.

Design Army set up the photo shoot to match the text from Alice in Wonderland.

My favorite -- a shot illustrating a scene from The Nutcracker, taken at the Meridian Center on 16th Street.

So, who is this army? A married couple, Jake and Pum Lefebure, who met while they were working for Supon Phornirunlit, another talented DC designer whose Kalorama home we shot for the magazine I used to edit for HGTV, interestingly enough. Jake and Pum now have nine people working for them in their building on H St., a former pool hall that was ruined in the ’68 riots.

They design magazines such as Washingtonian Bride & Groom, with layouts like this:

Photographer Cade Martin took these pictures at Glen Echo, the site of my own second birthday party!

What a dream. All the photo and art direction was from Design Army.

I don't know of a more clever way to do a spread on wedding shoes.

Design Army also works with many architectural firms. They did the Web site for Cole Prevost, for example, and they’re going in with Studio 27 on the new cultural center in Rosslyn, which occupies the spherical building  of the former Newseum.

They also do corporate annual reports and invitations to charity events — and anything else design-oriented that one could possibly come up with. In their new space on H Street, it’s impossible for this army not to pull out big creative victories.

I would love this much light and air in my workspace.

Here's a company after my own heart, color-coding the books in its library.

A detail of the mannequin heads Jake found and painted.

This just seems like such a happy place to work.

When Jake and Pum left Supon to start their own business in 2003, they played around with lots of names. “We wanted to sound big. We wanted to sound well-organized, and we wanted to say DESIGN,” Jake says. Design Army fit the bill, the the Web domain was available. Seven years later, with a total of 11 designers, they don’t intend to add any more regiments. “This is full size for us,” Jake says. Considering the quality of their work, I think they’ve found their lucky number.