B. Creative Design & Services' Brenda served as an Artifacts Supervisor for the Harry Potter: The Exhibition, overseeing install and dismantle teams in numerous countries during its 10 year tour. Whether uncrating and arranging for display or carefully disassembling and preparing for travel, the utmost care was devoted to preserving the integrity of the original props and costumes.
In 2010, Brenda was brought on by GES to lead the dismantle and packing effort of Harry Potter: The Exhibition in NYC. It was 14,000 sq ft experiential exhibition, which encompassed 2 floors of the Discovery Center Times Square. The first challenge was that she had never seen the movies or read the books! Luckily, the skillful team of stagehands assigned to her had been part of the installation and were avid fans of the franchise.
The exhibition, while wildly successful, was a giant collection of props and costumes from films, not designed for travel. This was already its 5th venue, yet there was limited organization or documentation on how to properly pack and handle the massive collection of original movie memorabilia. Brenda spent every waking hour studying, taking notes, creating an organized inventory, and establishing protocols for packing, crating, and documenting the condition of over 80 costumes, hundreds of authentic artifacts, and several bigger-than-life creatures. This work became the foundation for a “Harry Potter Artifacts Handbook” used for the tour’s next 15 stops over 10 years.
Brenda rejoined as Artifacts Supervisor for the installation in Tokyo and continued working with GES teams at subsequent global locations through the completion of its initial tour in 2020. Onsite responsibilities included collaboration with producers and department leads developing daily production schedules and daily goals, supervising the proper labeling, packing and unpacking of crates and boxes, and maintaining inventory lists documenting any changes, adjustments, or damages that occurred during transit, installations or dismantling of the exhibit. Since they often worked with local crews, training was required at every location, sometimes daily when consistent staff were not available.
WORKING VIA WHAT’S APP!
Coronavirus hit and the world shut down shortly before a scheduled trip to Lisbon for the final dismantle of the tour. With the clock ticking on the exhibit space and a global travel ban, GES got creative, and we rose to the challenge. As soon as any staff was allowed in the venue, Brenda and the other artifact supervisors located in various states and countries led crews of native Portuguese by “live video.” The days were long, screens small, app and internet temperamental, there was a language barrier, and a time difference. Despite the challenges, Brenda started at 3 am each day, leading a crew in the enormous task of properly dismantling, inventorying, documenting, and packing all of the costumes for their safe return to Warner Brothers in the USA. The learning curve was steep on both sides, but the crazy project succeeded in just over a week. We wouldn’t recommend the method, but we made it work.
