Some years ago I was at a party for an architecture firm in downtown Minneapolis. They had just completed the renovation of an iconic 1960s-era roadside hotel and the finished product was just gorgeous. As I was talking to one of the partners, I asked if they had given any thought to doing a deeper dive into storytelling in the spaces they were working in. After about 15 minutes of trying unsuccessfully to explain the bigger idea I was driving at, I noticed plans they had on a nearby desk for a new dentist office. And this was the story I told them…

Let’s say that before you even begin to design a dentist office, you find out a little more about the dentist. And let’s just say that in those conversations, you find out why your dentist became a dentist. You know… their story. And let’s say it turns out that your dentist became a dentist because as a 12-year-old hockey player he lost his front tooth in a game and had to get a new tooth. And for some reason that experience stuck with him so by the time he graduated from high school, he had decided on dentistry as his career path, which eventually brought everyone together years later to design his new offices.

With that information, in addition to designing a new office, you can also tell his story. Maybe you tell that story in the waiting area. Maybe its a small tooth encased in acrylic on the wall next to an old hockey stick with a short paragraph that tells you why your dentist became a dentist. However you tell the story, the important part is that when the next young hockey player–or anyone else for that matter–is sitting in the waiting area, they’ll have a chance to get to know their dentist before they may even meet him.

In that case, you’ve not just designed a waiting area, you’ve created the beginnings of a relationship.

And isn’t that what building a brand is all about?