Our client, The Wellborn Musclecar Museum, requested a series of internal posters celebrating their constantly rotating automotive collection. Housed in a fully restored 1940’s car dealership in Alexander City, Alabama, the museum has one of the finest collections of muscle cars in the country – a fact the client wanted to celebrate with internal “art” that avoided the traditional car poster look found in other automotive museums. They wanted an internal campaign with an edge.

Lewis approached this project as we do any – armed with research. Anyone (and most do) can admire the looks of a classic American muscle car. We needed to see past the obvious surface beauty. We needed to find out what elements these vehicles (and the overall museum) held that would speak to both connoisseurs and random passers-by. On multiple visits, we worked our way through the entire automotive collection, the parts warehouse, and the shop. We talked muscle cars with the Wellborn family, the staff, and visitors. We established baselines for those who owned, those who admired, and those who dreamed. Some vehicles we sat in while others we followed as they were driven around town. At the completion of our research, we had a complete idea of our target audience(s) and messaging.

The results of our The Wellborn Musclecar Museum research led to the creation of a series of dynamically photographed, tongue-in-cheek posters of multiple cars in the Wellborn collection. The photography, featuring non-traditional angles and perspectives, illustrates the power of the vehicles, both physically and mentally while the headlines invoke memories for those who lived during the vehicle’s heyday and lend an air of intrigue to those new to the collection. The client was pleased with the results and the posters now adorn the walls of the museum.