Curious Incident In Unique Window Collaboration With Liberty London: 'See Your World Differently'
Posted on 16 September 2015
The National Theatre’s Olivier and Tony Award winning The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time has teamed up with luxury department store Liberty to create a series of window displays to celebrate London Fashion week.
Kaffe Keating, who plays Christopher Boone in Curious Incident at the Gielgud Theatre, stepped into the windows in character when they were installed, and photographs are available.
The National Theatre’s creative team have worked closely with Liberty to create window installations that are in keeping to the style and themes of the multi-award winning play. For Liberty’s ‘See your world differently’ windows, the team were keen to play with and reinterpret elements of Bunny Christie’s set that illustrate the state of the mind of Christopher, the lead character of the story, whilst showcasing the best of Liberty’s fashion offering for London Fashion Week.
Inspired by poignant chapters in the book, each window represents a particular scene in the story to create a maze of distortion for Christopher to explore. Exaggerated perspectives and doorways have been used alongside flashing lights and printed prime numbers to create an air of both intrigue and confusion, whilst mirrored hallways distort vision and cause the viewer to question reality. Throughout the installation, faces of posed mannequins are illustrated with expressive lines to create differing emotions which adds to the overall atmosphere of the installation.
Mark Haddon’s story also impacts on the fashion chosen for the windows with carefully considered colour-palettes and repetitive layering. Checked clothing and accessories mirror Christie’s checkerboard set and compliment wearable trends by designers such as Acne, Marni and Paul Smith.
‘Elizabeth Silvester, Head of Visual Identity at Liberty says: “We were thrilled when AKA offered us the opportunity to work with such as acclaimed set designer as Bunny Christie, as apart from feeling it was a wonderful fit, the collaboration enabled us to do something totally different for our Fashion Week windows. It was exciting to be challenged as a creative team to sensitively reinterpret Curious Incident’s powerful set whilst making sure to incorporate Liberty’s aesthetic and showcase the best of Liberty’s fashion offering for London Fashion Week.
We hope the windows will delight people who have seen the show and intrigue those who have not.”
Bunny Christie, Theatre Designer, added: ‘When we started working on the stage production of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, the entire creative team was obsessed with creating Christopher Boone’s remarkable world on stage – through our set design, lights, projections, music, and story-telling. And I’m absolutely delighted that the team at Liberty has been inspired by the show, and Mark Haddon’s original book to come up with beautiful windows which reflect Christopher’s journey as well as showcasing their fashions.’
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is adapted by Simon Stephens from Mark Haddon’s best-selling book. The production is designed by Bunny Christie, with lighting by Paule Constable, video design by Finn Ross, movement by Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett for Frantic Assembly, music by Adrian Sutton and sound by Ian Dickinson for Autograph.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, is running a the Gielgud Theatre, London and on a tour of the UK and Ireland
