Fifth Avenue: After Dark

Session details:

What does it take to turn one of the world’s busiest streets into a holiday light show? This session presents a case study of nearly twenty years of Fifth Avenue holiday façades, from the modest beginnings of early 2000s “huge-at-the-time” designs to today’s massive, media-driven spectacles powered by thousands of universes and hundreds of thousands of pixels.

We’ll trace the design evolution of two iconic projects and examine how new tools, growing expectations, and shifting creative workflows have reshaped the process. Beyond the lights themselves, the case study explores the collaboration between designers, programmers, and builders - as well as and the unique logistical puzzle of installing complex systems on existing buildings... in Manhattan,… on a compressed seasonal timeline… in the middle of the night.