Lighting
show designer Nick Gray of Renegade was back for his third London Collections –
Men (LCM) SS14 fashion experience, where he lit the two main spaces at Victoria
House and The Hospital Club in central London.
All the primary British fashion
Council (BFC) runway collections across the three show days took place in the
basement of Victoria House, a fabulous warehouse space complete with original
exposed features like pipework and ventilation plant. The place was whited out
for the event as part of a high-impact scenic design by Bacchus.
Gray lit it as a fully multi-purpose
area which was also used for several static presentations in addition to the
catwalk shows, emphasising ‘slick and cool’ as the desired ambience.
The main technical challenge was in
creating around 25 new rigging points in the ceiling and walls so mini-beam
trusses could be installed in exactly the correct places to provide lighting
positions. This work was completed by Outback Rigging after elaborate
consultation with Gray and his team, after which Renegade commenced putting in
the kit needed to light the workspace.
The principal creative brain-teaser
for lighting was to deal with the many different physical levels involved. The
intensities of each luminaire had to be meticulously tweaked and tuned to
ensure consistent coverage and colour temperatures all down the catwalk and
across the presentation areas – although the fixtures were at different heights
and distances.
The lighting kit was all supplied by
Renegade and featured 77 x ETC Source Four Profiles with different lenses and
44 x Source Four PARs as the main sources, plus some Minuette fresnels and two
Martin MAC 700 Profile moving lights.
They were all daylight corrected to
match the aesthetics of Bacchus’s grey and white design.
Renegade’s Crew Chief was Chris Fyfe
and they also designed and installed an extensive power distribution and cable
infrastructure.
At the Hospital Club in Endell
Street, Covent Garden was the core presentation and studio space for the LCM
run of shows, and this also required lighting with a plethora of uses in mind,
from static designer collections to an evening of Fashion Films presented by
The British Fashion Council, Dazed & Confused and River Island.
Gray chose a combination of 2K
fresnels and ETC Source Four PARs to create a variety of looks and cover the
heterogeneity of installations.
He also used around 30 x 500W Coda 4s
to backlight material walls on both sides of the studio.
All the lighting was again daylight
corrected and Gray developed a
distinctive lighting treatment for each installation.
He comments, “I have been involved
with lighting London Collections – Men since it started and seen it grow
enormously acquiring profile and presence in a very short time – all very
exciting! I like the opportunity to blend classic fashion lighting techniques
with bold new experimental ideas to produce the fresh and vibrant looks for
everyone using the areas”.
