“It is the attention to detail that makes the difference between average and stunning,” wrote Francis Atterbury. Although the English statesman, who was born in 1663, lived long before anyone ever thought of lighting a fashion show, he undoubtably would have appreciated what Seth Bernstein accomplished at the launch of the H&M and Mugler collection that took place at the Park Avenue Armory this spring.

The star-studded event was the subject of lavish media praise, not only for the celebrity sightings and chic styles, but also because of a stunning scenic design by Niklas Bildstein Zaar and his team at Berlin-based SUB. Departing from traditional fashion show norms, the design rewrote the rule book, creating a concert-like aura with its circular set, spiral runways and massive curved video screens.

Underpinning the entire production was a masterful lighting design by Bernstein. Like the scenic element it illuminated, Bernstein’s lighting was spectacularly attractive and unique, earning him widespread admiration among peers. True to Francis Atterbury’s words, Bernstein’s stunning accomplished was the result, not just of creative inspiration, but also of some careful attention to detail on his part.

From figuring out the optimal circumference of the set’s circle, to triangulating lights to compensate for a relative lack of hang points, to balancing panel lights and other fixtures, to working around New York City’s strict regulations regarding haze, Bernstein and his team diligently worked even the smallest of details to come up with something that awed with its elegant balance and beauty. He talked to us about the process behind this grand design.

This was a very innovative design for a “fashion show,” although the event was much more than that. What were your impressions when you saw the design from SUB for the first time?
“The original creative intent from SUB was very surprising in the context of other projects we’ve discussed. Typically their live show work involves elaborate set construction and heavy use of smoke to hide any visible fixtures and rigging elements. For this show the creative intent was closer to their architectural designs which bring technology to the foreground. I saw miles of visible cable in the renders, speakers beyond what was required for the space and lots of artfully concentric trusses.

“From a fashion show perspective, the asymmetry of the design was also quite surprising. The screens were purposefully designed to follow different arc lengths and centers instead of tracing anything near a unified circumference.”

A signature characteristic of that design was its circular light curtain. Can you tell us a bit about how you decided to accent that element with light?
“The light curtain was always meant to be executed using a linear batten product — the main decision left up to me was the size of the circle. The original intent showed the curtain following the circumference of the screens on the audience entry side at about 110’ diameter if memory serves me correctly. From years of experience, I know that time in the venue is always limited, and the more you can prevent elements from being built on top of each other, the better the result –so screens can be built along side us instead of having to wait.”

“Because of this I pushed for an 87’6” circle that traced the edges of the stages to stay clear of the screen build. I did this for logistics, but also I observed that the slightly smaller diameter was much more useful for the varying purposes this circle could serve, such as runway light and accents for music performances. The 110’ circle was pretty much only useful pointed straight down as a curtain. Impressive but limited in the context of the show.
When I proposed the change everyone was resistant because it naturally looked smaller in subsequent renders. But I kept saying 87’6” is HUGE. Of course, when we saw it in person everyone agreed.”

In addition to the fashion show, you had to transition to bands and DJ entertainment. How did you account for that in your design?
“As I noted, I was constantly shifting elements away from conceptual design and into decisions that supported flexibility during the show. Another example of this is the use of sky panels. In the original design the renders showed only LED panels, no strobes, or spots. I knew that this would limit us since having panels would be amazing, but too many of them would wash out the room. Therefore I found the “essence” of this design’s intent and started to change various concentric trusses to other fixture types.”

When lighting the entertainment did you busk?
“There certainly was an element of busking, but we did about 5 days of pre vis in Depence for the music acts since our rehearsal time was so limited. Our programmer Mark Butts is a brilliant and rhythmic operator. We’ve done a lot of very fluid shows together, such as Latin Grammys, and ‘3 nights of Wizkid Afrobeats’ at the O2 in London. So, we’ve been developing strategies to execute flawless shows without killing each other for years. For this show, we used the album tracks to build a cue list for verse, chorus, breakdown, bridge etc. We then recorded the Depence video and audio feed to circulate for creative discussion. This helped save a lot of time since we were all on the same page to some extent before we hit the floor for rehearsals.

“On top of that, Mark created pages of executors for each artist that could be used rhythmically for building intensity on top of the cue list. Normally this would all be on timecode, but Mark is able to run 15-20 songs like this from memory. Truly a remarkable feat to “busk” that many songs… but it’s the pre vis practice that allows the muscle memory to be built.”

There was a very compelling element of reveal in this show when the models came out and hints of their presence were shown on screen. How did you use light to direct the audiences attention as the show began?
“One of the biggest feedbacks we got from the fashion creative director is that he always wanted to know where to look. That being said we also were only able to do one rehearsal in linear order with all elements… so the transitions were mostly done by intuition. Luckily, the screens were so bright that when we needed to black out the stage while the dancers were still exiting they were lit by the screen footage of the models. It looked very intentional because we considered the relative brightness of all elements when planning the design.”

You mentioned that you wanted to created an industrial feel in this show by not hiding fixtures. Can you elaborate on how you did that?
“We not only didn’t hide the trusses, fixtures and speakers, we used them as texture for lighting effects in the haze. In the renderings I noticed that the artist had added ambient light in the negative space to reveal the contours of all the trussing. I thought that would be a really unique idea to try and replicate that effect in real life by purposefully backlighting the production elements.”

Can you tell us how big your video screen was? What kind of images did you show on it? How were those images created and how were they fed to the video wall?
“There were three semi circular LED walls with about 260 linear feet in total. Dirk Sanders was the screens director, and was mostly sending various camera feeds to the screens. We ended up relying on a lot of video feedback effects which operated unpredictably but added lots of energy to the show.”

Earlier, you told us that the Park Avenue Armory presented some challenges regarding hanging fixtures. How did you address these challenges?
“I love the Park Avenue Armory — I think it’s one of the best venues in the world. The building has iconic vaulted arches that are the only usable rigging points in the venue. When you’re dealing with all these concentric circles you end up needing a lot of points that don’t line up with the arches… which means the rigging teams need to triangulate these complex bridles to get motors where you need them. We also had a very limited load in time, so most of the trusses were GT pre-rig with the fixtures already installed. These are heavier than typically trusses (leading to more rigging challenges) but it was the only way to get this show built in the two days we were allotted.”

Can you describe how you were able to arrange motorized batten fixtures so they lined up right up against each other?
“I was able to solve this problem in the way we solve all problems — testing and coordination. We had an actual segment of the 87’6” brought to the lighting shop where we tested how close we could get the fixtures before they collided during homing. We also “rehearsed” how the electricians would need to flip and adjust the clamps to work around the truss cords so everything would stay super regular. We then spoke with the head electrician to develop a way of powering on smaller segments of the rig at a time. Then we held our breath while we did it at full scale!”

New York City has some strict haze restrictions, how did that influence your work?
“New York just tightened restrictions on atmosphere and we learned that we wouldn’t be able to use haze in rehearsals until the day before the show. This is another example of where using Depence pre vis and our extensive testing came in handy because we were able to visualize all of these bold ideas without any safety net for adjustment on site.”

Looking at this project now, what are the big lessons you learned from it?
“My biggest lesson is a confirmation of everything we already knew — go with your gut, test all assumptions and then maintain flexibility at all costs, even if everyone in the process doesn’t see the logic of that until later.”