For over two decades, the influential Coachella music festival has served as a vibrant cultural convergence point, annually pulling together renowned global artists. It provides an immersive experience blending music, visual art, fashion, and gastronomy and serves as a platform for emerging talents to rub shoulders with established stars.
UK singer-songwriter, Suki Waterhouse aimed to create a magical woodland stage for her performance at the festival. The artist and her design team spent countless hours devising and crafting a captivating set adorned with shimmering leaves, exotic flowers, and a giant moon. Waterhouse’s soulful melodies, combined with the fantastical ambiance, created a surreal spectacle for her audience.
The realization of Waterhouse’s enchanted forest-themed stage owes much to her collaboration with COUR Design, a Nashville-based group experienced in stage design. Sharing Waterhouse’s creative vision, they seamlessly translated her ideas into a captivating physical reality.
Waterhouse’s enchanting Coachella woodland stage
Inspired by the E.T. ride at Universal Studios Orlando, the set creation started in February, amidst the challenges posed by Waterhouse’s pregnancy. The Nashville-based team, showing remarkable dedication and passion, navigated these hurdles to construct a visually magnificent set over several weeks.
Blending digital and physical design elements, the team used realistic plant life from Los Angeles film prop warehouses to create an authentic forest feel. 3D animators transformed these props into highly realistic models, delicately incorporating movement, lighting, and shadows to enhance the illusion of realism.
Next, texture and color were added using detailed photographs of actual plants as references. This meticulous treatment resulted in convincing flora that subtly changed with the ambient light, reminiscent of real-world foliage.
The team carefully placed each plant according to the storyboard, building a virtual woodland from dense jungles to serene meadows. A final pass of refinements and adjustments perfected the timing, lighting, and color, bringing their harmonious vision to life.
Complemented by moving visuals and dramatic lighting, the meticulously crafted set closely resembled Waterhouse’s original concept, blurring the lines between reality and illusion. Tailored soundtracks accompanying this visual spectacle further transformed the stage into a dynamic panorama, vividly bringing the creative vision to life.
