BOB RAYNER
TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST

When David King decided to move his advertising agency to a 19th-century schoolhouse in the Fan, he made sure renovations started at the top.

"The first thing I did was put a new roof on. We've seen enough water."

He has spent nearly nine years building The King Agency into one of the area's more successful small ad firms, a shop that honed its reputation for sharp, imaginative creative work.

By August 2004, The King Agency had expanded into two buildings on North 17th Street in Shockoe Bottom.

He nearly lost it all in an afternoon downpour.

When floodwaters from the remnants of Tropical Storm Gaston swept through the Bottom, they nearly drowned King's business. The bright first-floor offices looked like a mud bath. Virtually all of the agency's computers and equipment -- much only a month old -- were destroyed.

"We took a $175,000 hit," King said. Insurance did not cover the flood damage.

As bad as that was, the agency faced an even bigger problem: no place to work.

Despite the catastrophic losses, King was determined to save his business.

And he knew that meant keeping those clients.

"I called them all that morning when I got back to the agency and realized we wouldn't be working out of there anytime soon. You can buy computers all day long. It's the clients that are hard to find."

King caught a couple of breaks. He managed to salvage his own computer and the work saved on the disk drive. Some pals at a nearby agency, which has since closed shop itself, lent him space. The King Agency was back in business -- and its clients stayed on board.

"We bought some computers and were working by noon the next day," he said.

Mickey Chainski, senior vice president for marketing services at SunTrust Mortgage, a client for six years, said The King Agency's destruction was barely noticeable to clients.

"He didn't impose any of that hardship on us. His operation was essentially unchanged. Their telephone number didn't even change. He's very resilient."

Still, the agency needed a new home. King wasn't sure if he wanted to stay in the city.

Then, he stumbled across the perfect spot on North Lombardy Street, a long brick building -- with nosebleed high ceilings -- built in 1887 as a one-room schoolhouse. Later, it served as the auditorium for a newer school next door on West Main Street and as offices for an architecture firm.

"This is a great area. You've got the cafˇs, the art store," King said.

He found financing: "First Market Bank was great."

He hired Gwaltney Fleming, a local interior architecture firm, to create that distinctive ad-agency vibe, calculated to send a not-so-subtle message to clients -- and prospective clients.

"I know when our clients let us loose, they get more than they imagined." So he gave the designers maximum freedom.

The renovation is all but finished. King pronounces himself entirely pleased with the building, filled now with glass and light and unexpected colors.

He's most interested, though, in talking about his clients, which include The Virginia Eye Institute, SunTrust Mortgage, Henrico Doctors' Hospital, Bottoms Up Pizza and the Greater Richmond Area Honda Dealers Association.

He likes the mix. "It's fun to focus on heart transplants one day and sell pizzas the next."

Advertising remains a fiercely competitive business.

"We try to match our personalities with clients we get along with," King said. "We try to form a bond. Of course, it comes down to the bottom line, if they're seeing results."

SunTrust's Chainski said King's work "has been very creative. But it's not just creative for the sake of being creative. It's very on target. He listens to us, then he thinks for himself. He usually comes up with something that's on target early in the process. That's huge."

King consistently produces superior creative work, she said.

"Not a lot of small shops do that. A lot of small shops say they do. I think it's because he puts so much of himself into the job."

The eight-person agency creates in all media -- print, television, radio, online and direct-marketing materials.

"We've always been lucky to have good clients that let us do good work," King said.

"We're trying to spread our wings and move in different directions to keep it interesting and fun and keep people from getting bored." Or wet.