Letter Four

Premium design-build firm lost in a massive crowd.

Jeremy Baker and Lauren Adams had built Letter Four into one 
of LA’s few authentic design-build firms. But after 14 years of building stunning homes and commercial spaces, nearly every other contractor in their region was flying the design-build flag – even GCs that outsourced design.

Sticker shock killing potential deals after preliminary pricing

Disconnect between exceptional work and average branding

Ineffective messaging across all touchpoints

Founder dependency limiting growth potential

Revenue plateaued despite 20% growth targets

Scope
Brand Strategy
Visual Identity
Copywriting
Art Direction
Illustration 
Print Collateral
Environment
Signage
Web Design

Contributors
Photography: 
Marcelo Coelho

Real Design-Build

During discovery, I heard again and again about the firm’s honesty, simplicity and harmony. Transparent pricing and communication. Simplicity from one team with four disciplines. Harmony 
from equally valuing design and construction and keeping them in constant communication.

Here’s how I summed it up in their sales script: 
“A lot of companies say they do design-build, but few have design and construction represented at the partnership level, and even fewer offer architecture, interior design and construction under one roof. That’s why our tagline is All Design. All Build. All the Time.”

Sometimes repositioning means doubling down on the one thing you actually deliver while everyone else just promises it.

Brand Strategy Highlights

Unbreakable Idea

All Design. All Build. All the Time.™

Purpose

Building should be a peaceful partnership for everyone involved.

Mission

We’re here to guide you on a radically simple journey to the space 
where you belong. 

Vision

The end of painful construction projects.

Values

PEACE: Purpose · Ethics · Artistry · Curiosity · Engagement

Promises

White-glove service · Real Design-Build™ · Full transparency · 
 A place to belong

Spirit

We are visionaries leading visionaries.

Manifesto (excerpt)

Where we live is inseparable from how we live, and the defining quality of a good building is that it feels like a natural extension of the people who use it.

Of course, your house should be a home. That’s given. So why can’t our offices and stores and hotels feel just as inviting? If they’re made by and for humans, why is it okay for buildings to be dull and uncomfortable?

The buildings in our lives should place us and anchor us. Because we don’t live on the internet or in the clouds. We live in structures on streets in neighborhoods. Our built environments should feel like a second skin, an extension of our identities, in communities we love.

Revolution, then Evolution

To help Letter Four double down on design-build and stand apart from competitors with similar claims, we overhauled and turbo-charged their brand strategy and messaging. Same offering, all-new words – a revolution.

Visually, a comprehensive evolution was the right move. The firm’s previous visual identity wasn’t terrible. The concept behind their symbol was brilliant but poorly executed. Their distinctive peach color was a breath of fresh coastal air; it had to stay, full stop.

The comprehensive part? Everything else changed, from new colors to typography, graphic elements, photography and layout. And I went a layer deeper, helping Letter Four streamline and redesign their processes, templates and tools for marketing and business development.

The Science of Good Vibes

Letter Four wanted to bring graphic design in-house after the rebrand. To streamline layout decisions and ensure coherence across media, I devised a modular 12 x 12 grid and a standardized set of proportions for layouts and image framing on-screen and in print. 

All seven proportions are based on musical intervals in the chromatic scale – from unison (1:1) and major second (8:9) to major seventh (8:15) – avoiding “minor chord” proportions where possible. This rule reinforces Letter Four’s brand attribute of warmth, subliminally giving the viewer a sense of calm optimism.

Beyond layouts, I used the grid for stylized letters and numbers that stretch and squeeze, adapting to the screen or page’s proportions. The blocky compositions resemble floor plans and pixels, both of which rely on rectangles to frame spaces.

Keeping It Actually Real

Since day one, Letter Four has been equal parts design and build. But a glance at their website and social media only showed finished projects. Manicured landscaping, immaculate interiors. None of the wet concrete, buzzing saws and steel-toed boots. None of the build.

It's an industry-wide pattern. Design-build portfolios show finished spaces, empty of people and pets. It makes sense – your eye catches architectural details without distractions. But empty rooms don't tell stories. And across the field, we saw a gap no one was filling: real people in the built environments where they actually live and work.

New photography by Marcelo Coelho covered both fronts: active construction sites, the team at work in their Mar Vista studio, and finished projects with real homeowners and tenants in the frame. The job's not done until someone moves in and makes it their own.

The rebrand didn’t just exceed expectations – it shattered them. The Cade completed their entire $20M capital campaign before the museum even opened its doors.

Today, the Cade Museum stands as Gainesville’s beacon for creativity and invention, with a brand that grows stronger with each new exhibit, program and partnership. What began as a request for marketing help became a total transformation – proof that when you frame your story right, the right people find it irresistible.

$20M before opening day

Phoebe Miles, Founder & Chairman

© 2026 Matthew Steel

Aurë Entúluva · Purpose Never Rusts