Live Production
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Patrick McDowell AW24 and SS25 Collections
Guildhall School collaborated with emerging fashion designer Patrick McDowell to present their Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter collections Orpheus’ Ball (February 2024) and Portraits of a Painter (September 2024) at London Fashion Week. Guildhall Production Studio’s award-winning Recording and AV department managed the HD livestream and provided comprehensive live-event production support. Held across multiple venues, including Milton Court Concert Hall and Milton Court Studio Theatre, the presentations featured Guildhall students as performers and crew.
In September 2024, the immersive runway experience included performances from emerging classical musicians, creating a dramatic atmosphere. The combined fashion show and performance celebrated the arts in the same way Glyn Philpot did in his artworks, depicting varying performing arts from opera to ballet to avant-garde performance.
Future and Form – Senseless
This was a collaboration between Guildhall Production Studio and the University of East Anglia (UEA). We worked with three writers on a project to celebrate UEA’s 50 years as a specialist institution. Each writer responded to the question: ‘What will writing look like in 50 years?’. We wanted to study the ways in which collaboration with creative technologies can shift and alter the role of the author. In addition, we aimed to explore how these new technological formats that can foster creative output can usher in changes in literary perception, as well as the ways in which digital mechanisms can encourage and facilitate greater inclusivity. Extended reality (XR) technologies have the potential to expand the practices of authorship and readership, and to advance how we define audience experience for these methods of storytelling. The creative work produced through this project ranged from an interactive online exhibition, a 360-degree virtual reality (VR) imaginarium and an XR staged production.
Senseless is a love story written by James McDermott and Steve Waters, the University of East Anglia’s dramaturg/senior lecturer in scriptwriting. This digital tale incorporates live staged theatrics with XR technologies. This production was a part of UEA’s Future & Form project and was developed in partnership with Guildhall Production Studio. It is a tale of love between Adam and Eve, set during a lockdown in the midst of a digital pandemic. Technology is integral to the plot and enables the storytelling to occur. Senseless is an exploration in discovering new tools and methods for theatre craft, developing a stage set that was both analogue and digital. Richard Moore, the Technical Supervisor, created a workflow between the different systems, which included media server software and real-time generative software. These different systems and modalities were streamlined for this multi-faceted digital production.
Tower Bridge – Blackout
Following the success of previous Tower Bridge collaboration, Terra Incognita – Here be Dragons, the team were commissioned to create Blackout, a video projection and sound installation, for the Bascule Chamber of Tower Bridge. Usually off limits to the public, and home to the bridge’s impressive counterweights, the Bascule Chamber presented an opportunity to create a bespoke piece of work for an unusual architectural space.
The piece was specially created in response to photographs taken by two City of London Police Officers, Arthur Cross and Fred Tibbs, in the immediate aftermath of the Blitz. In collaboration with the City of London Police Museum and the London Metropolitan Archives, the installation explored their hidden world as well as the impact of the Blitz across the city and beyond.
Beasts of London
Inspired by London Museum's collection and created by Guildhall Production Studio in collaboration with over 100 Guildhall School students and graduates, this four-star, multi-media and interactive experience tells the story of how animals have helped to shape our capital city through the centuries.
Bringing together intricate scenic art work and set design, the latest video projection mapping technology and an original orchestral underscore, Beasts of London transported audiences to nine different moments in London’s animal history from the crowds of the Roman amphitheatre to the busy streets of today’s Trafalgar Square. Narrated throughout from the perspective of London’s animal inhabitants, the characters are voiced by Guildhall School actors, alongside celebrities such as Kate Moss, Brian Blessed and Pam Ferris. The experience inspires audiences to think about London’s history in a new way.
The Telegraph - Beasts of London Review: 'A crazily enjoyable immersive experience' ****
The Standard - Beasts of London Review: 'A whole succession of creatures, provide an engaging way into history' ****
