…just add GrooveBoston.
When we got the call that it was once again time for the legendary MCPHS Harvest Ball, we broke out our huge Mythbusters-style design paper and some silver sharpies. The task was to turn the Boston Park Plaza’s Imperial Ballroom into an INTENSE club experience for 1,000 students — no sweat.
After some time hard at work, the design team sat back amongst a pile of discarded apple cider cartons and pumpkin pie tins (had to get into “harvest” mindset) and looked down at the final design. It was a masterpiece, complete with multiple packed lighting trusses over the dance floor, LED fixtures rigged in the balconies, video screens, and, of course, BANGIN’ audio.
Just one thing left to do… call up and let the hotel know we’ll need the standard 8+ hours to build this bad boy. Unfortunately, that’s not what the Park Plaza (and the erectile dysfunction seminar they were hosting that afternoon… not kidding) had in mind. “You guys should be all set,” they said. “You’ve got all the time you need between 5:30 and 7:00PM” … oh boy.
So we had 2 obvious options here:
- Cut back on the show and build something simple in the amount of time it takes to watch an episode of House, MD
- Decline the show and leave an awesome college crowd hanging out to dry
We’re not big on modest shows, and we certainly weren’t going to bail on MCP, so we decided on option #3– build a crazy huge dance club in an impossibly short time.
I’ll spare you all the technical details, but let’s just say it involved hoisting truss over the awning outside of McCormick & Schmick’s and building a big portion of the system in the crowded hotel kitchen. I must have blacked out for the craziness, but somehow we pulled it off. The system was ready, the crowd was juiced — chalk another legendary party up for MCPHS.
Always a blast guys, see you again soon. Hopefully with more time to build, but still.
{gallery [MCPHS - 11.21.08]}
