MONTREAL – The Duceppe theater company staged Judy Garland, la fin d’une étoile, a French language adaptation of Peter Quilter’s End of the Rainbow, which focusing on the last months of actress Judy Garland’s life, in Montreal from April 8 to May 16. Set designer Olivier Landreville required custom carpet to showcase Garland’s performance in a hotel suite, where a piano would sit. He turned to Vincent Rousselle, Duceppe’s technical director, for an assist, and Rousselle found a custom printed carpet solution from Enhance a Colour.
More details from Enhance a Colour (www.eacgs.com):
Duceppe, which offers an 800 seat venue with the highest seats just 21 feet from the floor, prides itself on the appearance of its floor related set design. “Everyone sees our floor so we pay attention to it,” says Vincent Rousselle, Duceppe’s Technical Director, who has worked in the theater business for 20 years and served as a technical director in over 100 productions.
“Some set designers need specific carpet colors and dimensions to complement the production’s costuming, props, set design, and lighting,” says Rousselle. “So we can’t go to a regular carpet store and say, ‘I need a 20-foot diameter circular carpet in this pattern.’ They’ll say, ‘These are the sizes, colors, and patterns we have. Take it or leave it.’”
Rousselle unsuccessfully searched the Internet for two months looking for the right kind of round carpet for the production’s set designer. “I found pre-printed round carpet about 6 feet in diameter in Montreal, but Mr. Landreville wanted something really specific for our carpet,” says Rousselle.
“When we asked our painted set design artistic vendors for a quote to paint carpet, it was too high,” says Rousselle.
Duceppe was also concerned about the durability of painted carpet because the finished product had to last through rehearsals, a 30-performance run, and a 30-performance tour schedule. “We had tried painting on carpet before, but it didn’t stay,” says Rousselle. “If you buy regular carpet and paint or dye it, the carpets usually have a Scotch Guard surface so nothing sticks to it.”
Like a growing number of theater technical directors, Rousselle accomplished what set designer Landreville required with custom, digitally printed carpet, which some in the industry say is promising to usher in a new era of digital theatrical set design.
Rousselle turned to Enhance a Colour (www.eacgs.com), an innovator in the large format digital printing industry, for custom 20-foot diameter circular carpet with the intricate design and color scheme specified by Landreville.
“Today digital dye-sublimation printed carpets can be printed in the full color spectrum from any electronic image in sizes and shapes limited only by the set designer’s imagination,” says Jim O’Connor, COO of Enhance a Colour. “If a designer can create an image on the computer screen, we can create and color match it perfectly in a variety of carpet grades.”
For instance, the company’s promotional grade carpet for theater and short-term events is available at up to 10’x 50’ lengths, and can be laser cut into smaller size “tiles” which can be put together to create any size visual display required. Circles and irregular shapes, such as a winding yellow brick road are also possible. Such promo grade carpet with a rubberized back is good for 120 days of use.
Longer term theater and event carpet, good for up to one year of use with or without a pad, is available in the same sizes and can be similarly “tiled” to create virtually any size visual display.
Heavier, Ultra carpet, designed for theater entryways and anywhere requiring longer term use, can be created in 10’x12’ sections and “tiled” for larger displays. Available as 16 oz. and 30 oz. carpet, this thicker carpet with jute backing is good for 5 plus years.
In Duceppe’s case, Enhance a Colour created a 20-foot diameter circular carpet for its Judy Garland production. To achieve this, the custom carpet company dye-sub printed in full color two 10’x20’ pieces of 11-oz. carpet. They put the two large pieces together with a slight overlap, and trimmed them down the middle to get an exact middle seam. They then trimmed around the outer edges to create the 20-foot circular carpet, and edged the carpet’s outer perimeter with a color-coordinated fabric for the finished look required. To save on shipping, the carpet was shipped in two pieces and joined in Montreal.
“With the Enhance a Colour digitally printed carpet, we got the size, shape, color, and design we wanted, and the finish of the carpet was amazing,” says Rousselle. “If a scenic artist had tried to paint carpet, there’s no chance it would have the same sharpness or color depth.”
While theatrical carpet was available to some set designers previously, it was limited in size, function, and color matching capability. In the past, for instance, some vendors printed in solvent ink, which could not be walked on, and was not color fast or washable. UV inks were a little better, but still not washable.
In digitally printed dye-sublimated carpets like Enhance a Colour’s, however, the carpet colors are actually transferred into the fibers of the carpet using extreme heat and pressure during printing, a process the company pioneered by designing and building its own custom machinery. This means that the carpet colors are color fast. The carpet can be walked on, rolled, shampooed, machine washed, or steam cleaned and still looks picture perfect – even in high-use areas.
“After doing 15 rehearsals and 30 shows on our Enhance a Colour carpet, the colors were still perfect with nothing rubbing off,” says Rousselle. “If it’s dirty we can get it steam cleaned.”
According to Rousselle, the custom carpet also fit well within Duceppe’s set design budget.
“The custom carpet cost about half the quote for hand painted carpet,” says Rousselle. “The savings allowed us to purchase custom 20-foot diameter circular carpet, instead of the 12-foot diameter carpet we would have been able to afford with hand painted carpet.”
Speed of delivery also helped Duceppe’s cast rehearse faster on a finished set. According to Rousselle, Duceppe received the custom carpet ten days after Landreville approved the color proof, about half the time it would take for a scenic artist to trace and paint carpet of similar size and complexity.
According to Rousselle, transporting and using the custom carpet is easy. “When we take the carpet on tour, we’ll just roll it up to transport it, then unroll it at our destination. There’s no need to tape the carpet down on stage because it stays down with its own weight.”
While Landreville did not inlay an image or logo in the theater company’s custom carpet, Rousselle anticipates that Enhance a Colour’s ability to do so could come in handy in future productions or even add excitement or branding to theater entryways. Such custom inlay carpets appear in everything from Broadway theater to red carpet Hollywood events and beyond.
Yet traditional carpet inlay sewn together in several pieces seldom matches colors well. In contrast, carpet inlay using dye-sublimated printing can exactly color match even a one-of-a-kind logo, mascot, or insignia.
“If you’re looking at a four color product like a logo, you can color print it right on point in one piece with dye-sublimated printing,” says O’Connor, who says the process can create full color logos up to 8’x10’. “So if you’re doing a 6 foot logo in your waiting area entry, the colors will match your logo perfectly and you can cut it into your existing carpet.”
Rousselle concludes, “Other technical directors I’ve talked with are amazed at the quality, color depth, and color separation you can get on carpet. Our company props manager also wants to do more with custom carpet because he can get the specific color needed and color match it with the rest of the set design. Such custom digitally printed carpet opens a new era in set design, and it’s up to us to explore the creative possibilities.”
