The launch was produced by Flux Events for London & Continental Railways (LCR) under the technical direction of John Farquhar-Smith. The executive producer was Jon Teeman, with Mark Fisher providing creative direction.
Arena Seating's key role was to provide a temporary seating grandstand three metres above the level of the platform, with the additional challenge of having to position the structure over an eight metre deep void. This needed to be achieved while the station was still being completed by a variety of building contractors who needed as much access underneath the structure as possible - something that the traditional scaffolding solution would not allow.
"We explored a number of different concepts," says Arena Seating's account director and project manager, Bradley Merchant. "We have previously worked with staging company ESS who are specialists in this particular area, so we invited them to help provide a solution. In the end they created what could be described as a giant, six legged snooker table structure underneath to support the seating." Subsequently ESS went on to provide other stages for the event as an independent contractor.
Arena Seating deployed 1,100 of its Diplomat range of seats in two banks, plus 72 Congress chairs for the VIPS. It also provided a range of disability platforms, photographers' platforms and ancillary structures. "As you'd expect for a launch as prestigious as this, the quality of finish was of the highest standard," Merchant says.
Load in and load out were an additional challenge, given the continuing construction work taking place around the site. "It was like building a ship in a bottle," says Merchant. "All contractors shared the one entrance, so each truck was unloaded one at a time in a very confined space" Consequently it was vital that trucks adhered to a strict delivery schedule, while, after a build that took six days, Arena Seating was required to strip out the structure within 12 hours.
(Jim Evans)
