The New Diner

So we've always called the area in the center of our agency space "the diner." It's where we all convene for Monday idea day lunches, where we break if we're brown-bagging it the rest of the week, and a last resort for holding meetings if our conference room has other people in it.

We've recently started to outgrow our diner in the past few years and have also desperately needed a more fully outfitted kitchen (picture rinsing out coffee cups in the bathroom sink every day). So Roy decided that as a reward to everyone at Third Degree for having such a great few years of growth and all that good stuff, that we could have a new place to rinse out our coffee cups, kick back, gather, get silly, get smarter, and just be.


Last Friday, it was unveiled, the new diner!

In true Third Degree fashion we had to design and execute it ourselves. Art director Kathleen and media buyer Jentry were given a budget, a few months, and a directive to take the unleased and unused corner space that was wasting square footage on the same floor as our agency, and transform it into – like the West Side Story song says – "a place for us."

The Vision

Kathleen and Jentry collaborated on a lot of top secret planning to mastermind this project. Plus, put buckets of sweat and tears into the execution to get it done.  It's why they do such good work for our clients – so the astonishing end product should have been no surprise to us. Above are the schematics that Jentry created.

Mood Board (sounds fancy, right?)

These are the visual inspiration pieces that Kathleen gathered. 

Ta Da!

Up until Friday the renovation had been concealed in mystery (that, and rolls of brown kraft paper taped up to the windows). And even though a small handful of us had gotten some sneak peeks in while the work was in progress, no one was prepared for how cool, bright, warm, exciting, just wonderful the space turned out to be. Keep in mind this was just an empty grey room up until then.


After all the paper was torn down and everyone gasped and oohed, and aahhed, we all lifted our glasses to the new Diner, and then started checking out all the little details.  Like that neat oversized print on the back wall which is actually a photo of the exterior of our Bricktown warehouse building printed onto wood panels. (Who knew you could do that? Thanks Simon Hurst for the cool night-time photo and Impressions Printing for printing on freakin' wood!).  

Other details we couldn't stop looking at...

This modular wall of clocks, cafeteria trays, corkboards, chalkboards and magnetic panels. 

These fun coffee table games and an etch-a-sketch and little bud vases with dice in the bottom.

A Wii game system! I think maybe Roy's making that face because he doesn't like the hairline Daniel is suggesting for the Roy-Mii character he's creating for him.

Like excerpts from our Third Degree brand book written on chalkboard paint columns.

Like jars filled with all sorts of fun stuff that just looks colorful and graphic and Third Degree-ish.

Like our original Third Degree logo that had been hiding in a back storage room area. It's now dusted off and fits right in with our original Third Degree person, Roy.

Like a shiny red retro streamlined fridge, which is being upstage by account coordinator Hallie's ridiculously festive Christmas vest.

Speaking of festive, we were also excited to greet our first surprise client guest to the new diner, Nancy from TFCU, who unexpectedly stopped by with some Christmas oranges and her self proclaimed over-the-top Christmas sweater/turtleneck combo, which trumped Hallie's self proclaimed over-the-top Christmas vest.  

Thanks Jentry and Kathleen for doing such an amazing job.

And thanks Roy for the awesome reward that makes it as cool as it's ever been for all of us to call Third Degree home.


Even if some of us insist on ruining it by wearing lame Christmas vests.

What's your favorite thing about the new diner?