Qatar Goodwood Festival
Pop up pavilion
Concept design 2015
(with Real Studios)
Two months to go, two days to create a concept!
The inaugural Qatar Goodwood Festival was taking place between 28th July and 1st August 2015. With two months to go, at the end of May, we were asked by Lord March to design and build a bespoke pavilion. We had 48 hours to present a concept.
The pavilion needed to balance ideas of Qatar and the ‘Glorious Goodwood’ horse racing event. This, together with the limited time available, dictated our approach: it needed to be simple, bold, singular and a talking point. A selection of inspiration imagery, and an idea for how the pavilion could become a buttonhole distribution point, pointed the design in an interesting direction.
Concept idea origins
Concept sketch workings
Concept drawings in situ
Hopefully the images and sketches here are reasonably self-explanatory: the overall arrangement was derived from the idea of two horses racing neck-and-neck; the dynamic form references flowing manes, flags, sails, dunes; colours reference the Qatari flag; and the intent was for the experience walking through or standing in the centre – enveloped in the colour and smell of thousands of fresh carnations – to be a talking point throughout the festival.
My role was the initial concept stage. I’ve since heard that populating the structure with thousands of red carnations was an all-night task in time for opening!
Images: Real Studios
