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PRG Europe on the road with Volkswagen
As part of Volkswagen Commercial Vehicle’s UK launch of its new Crafter van, the company took its show on the road in June and July, to four venues around the UK. With the van designed and built to meet the ever-increasing demands of modern industry, Volkswagen’s event agency WRP Ltd wanted the presentations, to specially invited audiences of Van Centres and fleet users, to have a rugged, commercial feel, and so working dockside locations in Newport (Wales), Ayr, Liverpool and Dover were transformed into a series of lively presentation theatres.
WRP brought in Pandemonium Productions to organise the production aspects of the event, who in turn contracted PRG Europe to supply the lighting design and equipment. Lighting designer Paul Cook explains further: “As each location only ran for two or three days, and was designed to cater for up to 100 people each day, presentations had to run like clockwork. As well as giving the set a “Top Gear studio” feel, the lighting also acted as a route guide for the visitors.”
The set, designed for Pandemonium by Ian Fogden, had a café area which acted as the hub, with satellite areas where demonstrations of the Crafter’s particular attributes took place. Paul Cook continues: “When the guests arrived, they were directed to the café area, so that was brightly lit while the other areas were dimmed. As the day progressed and guests moved around to the various satellite areas, so they were lit up in turn. All the guests had to do was follow the light!”
Most of the scenic element was truss, with PRG Europe supplying 150m of Total Fabrication’s exhibition quality XO truss, which also acted as the framework for the graphics for each area: the lighting design utilised Volkswagen’s corporate colours of orange and blue. The main challenge for Paul was the logistical one of getting maximum effect with the least amount of kit. “Because it was a road show, we tried to keep the equipment list to a minimum. The venues were completely bare, so we needed everything from generators upwards. The rig consisted mainly of chrome PAR 64s with some ETC Source Four profiles, 46 Color Kinetic ColorBlast wall wash lights in exhibition white, plus Mac 600s and MiniCity Colors.”
Project manager for PRG Europe was Loz Wilcox, who had just ten days to turn the job around: “Time was extremely tight and made tighter by the fact that two of the locations had been scheduled so close together that a duplicate kit had to be prepped and delivered for Liverpool.”
As always though, PRG Europe came up trumps, as Pandemonium managing director Simon Garrett explains: “I believe in loyalty. I’ve known Alan Thomson of PRG Europe for a long time and the company has worked on many projects for me. Over the years we have come to understand how each other works and they know the effect I want. I always get good service and they certainly didn’t let me down this time!” The sentiment was echoed by Paul Cook: “PRG Europe, and particularly their crew chief Ross Corbett, did a fantastic job!”
photos: Steve Russell
20th July 2006
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