Adams Design

Adams Design Adams Design is a Boston-based brand identity and placemaking studio helping organizations reposition, differentiate, and define destination.

Our work encompasses graphics and brand identity, website design and digital experiences, advertising and communications. We believe that great design cannot happen without passion, intelligence and personal commitment, and is demonstrated by a portfolio that spans 3 decades and a variety of industries.

Somewhere along the way, we started asking the wrong question.When reviewing creative work, the conversation usually sta...
08/05/2026

Somewhere along the way, we started asking the wrong question.

When reviewing creative work, the conversation usually starts with "Do I like it?" That's a natural reaction. But it's not the most important one.

The better question is "What is it communicating?"

Those two questions sound similar. They lead to very different outcomes.

In branding, every decision should have a purpose. Color isn't decoration. Typography isn't a stylistic choice. Scale, proportion, symbolism, photography, messaging - each element shapes how people perceive a company before they've had a single interaction with it.

When decisions are guided by personal preference, the work can look good but lose its ability to communicate. When they're guided by purpose, a brand starts to tell a story, build an emotional connection, and differentiate itself in ways aesthetics alone can't achieve.

Over the years, I've come to believe the most valuable part of the design process isn't creating more options. It's understanding which solution best expresses a client's story, and explaining why.

Good branding isn't about making something everyone likes.
It's about creating something that says exactly what it needs to say.

Before the building opened, the story had already begun.A construction fence can begin telling a project's brand story m...
07/08/2026

Before the building opened, the story had already begun.

A construction fence can begin telling a project's brand story months before traditional marketing ever begins.

At One Harbor Shore, the final residential building at Fan Pier, the construction scrim became an opportunity to introduce the lifestyle, personality, and spirit of the development while the building was still taking shape.

Rather than treating the perimeter as a temporary barrier, we used it as a canvas to reinforce the brand and build anticipation for what would become one of Boston's last waterfront residential opportunities.

Every day, pedestrians along the Harborwalk, office workers, visitors, and future residents encountered the project before they ever stepped into a sales gallery. The construction scrim helped transform a work site into a branded experience, creating awareness and helping establish an emotional connection long before the building opened.

Too often, construction fencing is viewed as a practical necessity. In reality, it can be one of the earliest and most visible opportunities to tell a development's story and begin creating a sense of place.

The brand story shouldn't wait until marketing begins.

One of the questions I get asked most often is, "How do you come up with a name?"Most people imagine a room full of desi...
07/07/2026

One of the questions I get asked most often is, "How do you come up with a name?"

Most people imagine a room full of designers throwing words onto a whiteboard until someone lands on something everyone likes. In reality, the process is much more thoughtful than that.

Every naming project begins with discovery. We spend time understanding the company, product, or place, learning what makes it different, who it's meant to reach, and what story it has to tell. Once that foundation is in place, our copywriter and I begin exploring possibilities together, challenging each other's ideas, testing different directions, and looking for a name that feels both distinctive and authentic.

Some names are rooted in history or the surrounding landscape. Others are inspired by architecture, culture, or a single idea that captures the spirit of the brand. Occasionally, the strongest solution is an entirely new word because nothing that already exists tells the story quite the right way.

Once the name is established, it becomes the foundation for everything that follows. It shapes the brand strategy, informs the messaging, and inspires the visual identity, giving the entire brand a clear and consistent direction.

Over the years, we've named residential communities, restaurants, nonprofit organizations, corporate brands, and mixed-use developments.

While every project is different, the goal is always the same:

To create a name that people remember because it means something, not simply because it sounds good.


The brand story shouldn't wait until marketing begins.I always tell clients when we begin a branding project, that a con...
07/02/2026

The brand story shouldn't wait until marketing begins.

I always tell clients when we begin a branding project, that a construction fence can begin telling a project's brand story months before traditional marketing ever begins.

Long before the website launches, the sales gallery opens, or the first ad appears, the fence surrounding a site has the opportunity to introduce the development to the people who pass by it every day and set the tone for what is to come.

Neighbors walking their dogs, commuters heading to work, future residents exploring the neighborhood. It's often the first chance to communicate what the project is, who it's for, and how it will contribute to the surrounding community.

For Echelon Seaport, a brand refresh introduced large-scale graphics and transformed the construction perimeter into a branded experience, creating visibility at one of the Seaport's busiest development sites and introducing the project's distinctive identity to the public.

Too often, construction fencing is treated as a temporary necessity. In reality, it's one of the earliest opportunities to build awareness, create anticipation, and begin shaping perceptions of a place before it exists.

Lately, I've been noticing how much adaptive reuse has become part of the development conversation.The projects shown he...
06/08/2026

Lately, I've been noticing how much adaptive reuse has become part of the development conversation.

The projects shown here all started as something else entirely, yet the history of each building became one of its greatest assets.

That's what makes adaptive reuse so interesting. You're not creating a story from scratch. You're uncovering one that's already there.

The three projects shown here, Strada 234, Appleton Mills and Penmark, all found new life through adaptive reuse.

Each required a different branding approach, but in every case the history of the building became one of its greatest assets.

Strada 234, a former biscuit factory reimagined as condominiums in Boston's South End.

Appleton Mills, a former textile mill transformed into artist lofts.

Penmark, a historic school converted into residences.

The best adaptive reuse projects don't erase history.

They build upon it.

Lately, I've been thinking more about the difference between premium and luxury in branding.They can look similar on the...
05/19/2026

Lately, I've been thinking more about the difference between premium and luxury in branding.

They can look similar on the surface, but they communicate very different things.

Luxury branding has traditionally relied on signals of exclusivity, aspiration, and perfection.

But many of the strongest premium brands today are building connection in a different way. Through clarity, warmth, intelligence, responsiveness, and emotional ease.

That shift changes the design conversation.
The visual language becomes softer.
The messaging becomes more human.
The experience becomes less about status and more about care.

We recently began work for a concierge pediatric practice, and it reinforced this idea immediately. No one wants a child’s healthcare experience to feel luxurious in the traditional sense.

They want it to feel calm. Thoughtful. Personal.

The most effective premium brands today are often the ones that understand emotion, not just aspiration.

Newbury Street:A district-wide rebrand unifying Newbury Street’s fashion, retail, dining, and cultural destinations under one cohesive identity.

The Gaila Fund: A brand identity and messaging system for a nonprofit redefining beauty and self-expression for women navigating cancer.

Vivo Apartments: A residential identity translating the culture of Kendall Square into a more human, connected, and internationally minded living experience.

Seaport Hotel: A waterfront hotel identity that reinterprets Boston’s maritime language for a contemporary hospitality experience.

Learn more at www.adamsdesignboston.com

We make you look twice.And then we make sure you don't forget it.At Adams Design, the brands we build aren't the loudest...
05/07/2026

We make you look twice.
And then we make sure you don't forget it.

At Adams Design, the brands we build aren't the loudest in the room. They're the ones with the clearest story. That story starts with strategy, not a moodboard. Once the idea is clear, everything we create has a purpose.

Most stone fabricators show you the slab. We built a fairytale around it.

Using the CUMAR Marble and Granite children as models, each slab became a stage, each image a different story. It won awards. It drove new business. And it gave an eighth-generation company a brand worthy of the next eight.

Most real estate agents look like every other real estate agent. Emma Guardia doesn't.

We built her brand around a single bold idea: the letter E, architectural, reductive, designed for street scale. Then we created fashion editorial portraits that were conceptual, fun, and completely unexpected for a real estate agent.

For The Bristol Wellesley, the story was simple: life gets better when it gets easier.

A beautiful home in the town they loved, without the weight of a large property. We built the brand around that feeling. Life Made Easy. The imagery, photographed with a fashion editorial feel, made ease look like the most elegant choice you could make.

Battery Wharf Residences was sitting on one of Boston's most extraordinary addresses and nobody knew it. It didn't need more amenities. It needed a story. We gave it one: Wonderfully European, comparing the site to world renowned resort cities. The campaign didn't sell condos, It sold the feeling of living somewhere that felt nothing like Boston.

Great visual storytelling isn't made. It's built. From the inside out.

Learn more about our brand identity and branding at www.adamsdesignboston.com

Cumar, Emma and Battery Wharf photographed by Stephen Sherman Photography Boston
The Bristol photographed by Bob Packert - Visual Artist

Safe branding is expensive. Stay within the category. Don’t push too far. But what you gain in comfort, you lose in dist...
04/21/2026

Safe branding is expensive. Stay within the category. Don’t push too far.

But what you gain in comfort, you lose in distinction.

When everyone is using the same symbols, the same colors, the same language, you don’t look established. You look interchangeable.

And interchangeable brands don’t get chosen. They get compared.

That’s the cost of playing it safe.

The real risk isn’t standing out.
It’s disappearing into a sea of sameness.

The work only works when it takes a position.

Work shown: Echelon Seaport (Cottonwood Group, The Collaborative Companies), Belclare Wellesley (The Noannet Group, The Collaborative Companies), Penmark (RF Walsh, Otis & Ahearn), Sensing Restaurant (Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, Kortenhaus Communications, Otis & Ahearn)

Learn more about these projects and others at www.adamsdesignboston.com

The first thing most clients tell me is what they want the logo to look like.Before we've talked about what they do diff...
04/17/2026

The first thing most clients tell me is what they want the logo to look like.

Before we've talked about what they do differently. Before we know who they're actually talking to. Before there's anything to say.

And I always think the same thing: how can you tell me what it should look like before you know what it should say?

A logo that starts with aesthetics is working backwards. It ends up carrying weight it was never built for. Explaining things. Justifying things. Doing the job that strategy was supposed to do.

The strongest identities I've worked on started with a point of view, not a Pinterest board.

When the idea is clear, the logo almost designs itself.

A few examples where we figured out what to say first.

The Cape Club, Liberty Wharf, Stratus Residences

See more about these projects at www.adamsdesignboston.com

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