In 2016 we worked with BBC Music at Glastonbury festival for the third consecutive year. As with previous deliveries, the project saw the creation of a colourful festival stage design for the Broadcaster.
Our brief was to create a panoramic stage backdrop which would really stand out on camera. Our client wanted us to design something you would not expect to find behind the Pyramid Stage and it needed to look imposing despite the limitations of space inside the tepee. Key elements to the brief required our final design to be colourful, unique and highly unusual…so we set to work.
For this year’s concept we created a dilapidated 18th Century Orangery. Taking inspiration from the ornate glass windows typical of such structures, our art team applied scenic painting techniques to age the window frames, giving them a distinct decaying beauty. The rich rusty tones and crumbling paint textures of the frames were complemented by shards of pearlescent acrylic coated with a dichroic film to give a shattered glass effect. A steel frame was constructed to create a mount for the windows before being dressed with floral and foliage detail to give the appearance that the structure had been in situ for years, slowly becoming overgrown with vegetation. To complete the look, lighting positioned behind the set bathed the structure in vivid colours helping bring the festival stage design to life.
