Why Signage Should Be Considered Earlier Than You Think

I’ve yet to work on a project where signage was intentionally treated as an afterthought, but I have worked on plenty where it had clearly become one by the time we were engaged.

More often than not, signage enters the conversation after architecture is finalized, interiors are documented, and budgets are already spoken for. By the time someone asks where the signs go, or how the general public will be expected to navigate the property, the project is usually deep into coordination and running out of flexibility.

This timing is rarely about negligence from any one group within the project, it’s just how large, complex commercial projects tend to unfold. But in design-forward hospitality and mixed-use environments, bringing signage in late almost always creates more compromises than solutions.

When signage has a place at the table alongside branding, interiors, and site planning, the tone of the project shifts in subtle but meaningful ways for everyone involved.

This is where design intent starts to get boxed in

Once construction documents are underway, many of the conditions signage depends on are already locked in place. Wall assemblies are set. Power locations are fixed. Finishes are selected. Lighting conditions are assumed. Clearances are tight.

At that point, the conversation changes. It’s no longer “What could this be?” It becomes “What can we make fit, and how much time or money do we have left?”

This is where strong brand moments in concept can begin to lose their impact in the real world. Typography gets adjusted to accommodate constraints that could have been avoided. Materials get swapped to meet budgets that were set without signage in mind. Lighting decisions get made reactively, often without coordination with the signage team.

None of these compromises happen in isolation. Together, they can significantly change how a brand, or multiple brands, are experienced in a space.

Earlier coordination feels calmer for a reason

When signage is part of the conversation during schematic design or early design development, it stops behaving like a layer applied at the end and starts functioning as part of the spatial logic.

Brand designers gain a clearer understanding of how identity elements will live at scale and in context. Architects can anticipate how signage interacts with form, circulation, and material transitions. Developers benefit from clearer scope and fewer surprises downstream.

There’s also a noticeable shift in tempo. Early signage coordination rarely slows projects down. In practice, it tends to reduce RFIs, redraws, and last-minute value engineering. Decisions are made with context instead of urgency, which almost always leads to better outcomes.

That distinction matters more than most teams realize.

Signage lives at more intersections than most teams expect

Signage sits at the overlap of architecture, interiors, branding, electrical, lighting, and code compliance. Treating it as a standalone scope ignores how deeply it shapes the day-to-day long-term experience of a building.

In practice, this shows up in very human ways. When people are unsure where to go, they hesitate. They stop moving. They look around for reassurance. They interrupt staff. They follow others and hope for the best.

None of this signals poor judgment. It signals that the environment is not providing enough information at the right moment.

Wayfinding influences how people move through a space. Branded feature signage shapes first impressions. Regulatory signage has to meet code while still supporting the broader visual language of the project. In hospitality environments especially, clarity and experience are inseparable.

When signage is considered early, these layers reinforce each other instead of competing for attention.

Early involvement protects both vision and budget

One of the most persistent misconceptions we hear is that involving signage early increases cost.

Hand to heart, we struggled to think of a single project that benefited financially from waiting until construction was underway before engaging signage. In fact, nearly every project we’ve seen run over budget did so because signage arrived too late or had to be rushed to hit an inspection deadline.

Power had to be rerouted. Walls had to be opened up. Mounting systems had to be retrofitted. Details that could have been simple became expensive under time pressure.

Clear scope definition early leads to more predictable pricing. Material strategies can be evaluated before finishes are finalized. Fabrication methods can be selected based on intent rather than availability. It also opens the door to specialty fabrication techniques that are not necessarily more expensive, but often require longer lead times.

Those decisions are far easier to navigate when there is still room to adjust.

For developers, this means fewer surprises. For designers, fewer compromises. For the project as a whole, a more cohesive outcome.

Signage works best when it’s allowed to belong, from the beginning

Signage performs best when it’s treated as part of the design process, not a reaction to it. When it’s introduced early, brand, architecture, circulation, and experience evolve together instead of in sequence.

The goal is not more signage. It’s clearer environments, which often actually advocates for LESS signage. When clarity is built into the space, people move with confidence, staff spend less time troubleshooting, and the experience feels calmer and more intentional. These are all critical components to a successful branded environment roll-out, which means more work for brand designers, more natural buy-in from the community, and more revenue for developers / owners.

If you are in the early stages of a hospitality or mixed-use project and want to align signage with design intent from the outset, we would love to hear about it: Submit a project request.