Before: Future home of the CNN Grill. Within weeks, the fortress-like building across from the Democratic National Convention Hall will become a public forum for political discussion. COLLINS:, CNN and Civic Entertainment Group create the same transformation where the Republicans will gather.

The assignment is to translate CNN’s brand platform into a meaningful, direct experience at the CNN Grill. In a democracy, Politics = Everyone, so the team asks every visitor to CNN.com: “What does politics mean to you?”

Eloquent, insistent and profound, the voices of ordinary Americans become the touchstones for COLLINS:’ CNN Grill design.

The wisdom of citizens transforms the old warehouse building. Each line of type is an individual declaration. Instead of a fortress, the building becomes an icon of democratic thought.

“We wanted the CNN Grill to look like it had been there a while,” says one of our designers. The bottom detail shows how the team achieved the weathered look of Denver’s old “ghost” signs. The goal was to make the building familiar and surprising at the same time.

After sundown, the facade lights up with neon. The signs are constantly animated. They blink, pulse and spin with the energy of the political discussion going on inside.

Everybody’s a pundit at the CNN Grill. As visitors enter, their images are displayed on the video walls that flank the threshold, making everyone an “insider.” The CNN Grill is common ground for journalists, delegates, political operatives, celebrities and ordinary citizens.

New voters were a big story in 2008 and CNN recruited its own group of them to follow through the campaigns. Long hours made the CNN Grill the place to relax and reassess after floor sessions.

Journalists aren’t the only people with stories to tell. Google lists over a million links to reports filed from the CNN Grill, most by ordinary citizens using CNN’s iReport tools at free computer stations. Anyone at the Grill could tell the nation what was going on.

“Nothing fancy” is the design aesthetic. Even the custom-brewed ale looks down-home. Like the weathered signage outside, the COLLINS: team designed the label and the taps to feel like they’d always been there.

Conventioneers have a bottomless appetite for souvenirs, which the designers obliged. The popcorn container doubles as a megaphone, so visitors can make their voices heard inside the convention hall as well as electronically from the CNN Grill.

“CNN = Politics” is more than a slogan; it’s a fact at the CNN Grill.