Wildscreen Festival

Millennium Square, October 2018

A project of over six months in the making. The Alastair Currie Events team thoroughly enjoyed working alongside our client to meticulously organise their biannual Bristol Wildlife Festival bringing the best in the wildlife film industry to Bristol.

For the first time in the festival’s history, our client wanted to create a venue of their own. Allowing them complete exclusivity and the ability for full creative control. The venue’s purpose? – A space for their delegates to network, watch some of the most exciting films in the industry, listen to some amazing talks from their peers and check out the latest kit – all in the centre of Bristol.

Working with CMC Marquees we designed a bespoke venue consisting of two separate structures conjoined with a walkway. The structure, with solid wall panels and glazed windows, was perfect for creating a secure and warm space – especially important during Autumn. Clear roofs at the front of the structure worked perfectly to let in natural light, creating the perfect environment for networking and logging onto the festival’s Wi-Fi network to catch up on emails.

With an excellent central location and within walking distance of their festival’s other venues, Millennium Square was the perfect location for the Bristol Wildlife Festival “Hub”. We took over the Square for a total of three weeks; allowing a week long build, a week of festival fun and final week of de-rig.

The main Hub created a space for delegates to network, enjoy the offering from Wogan Coffee or vegan delights from the in-house caterers – both based behind a reclaimed wooden bar with living wall. Industry leads displayed and demonstrated their kit at various exhibition locations within the Hub – creating a buzzing atmosphere all day.

Furniture and décor within the structure was thoughtful yet simple – rustic, reclaimed wooden tables – some custom built especially for the event. The furniture much like the rest of the event was very in-keeping with our client’s environmentally-aware ethos. From water-less toilet units, to recycling stations and a ban on plastics – this event had a real emphasis on sustainability.

Stepping through a fully secure walkway delegates arrived into a ‘pop-up’ cinema space complete with state of the art AV equipment and even flip up cinema style chairs. Jam-packed with delegates from morning until late attending a full programme of industry led talks, debates and film showings – this space was very much a “Wildscreen” venue.

We were honoured to be involved in the Bristol Wildlife Festival, such an exciting event with such a strong environmentally-friendly ethos.