Chateau Ste. Michelle: Pride in the Park Sponsorship

Jun 27

Pride display of handmade letters and flowers — Our handcrafted Pride display for Chateau Ste. Michelle

How does one of the largest wine distributors in the country approach a local pride event sponsorship in a fun, meaningful and tasteful way? Chateau Ste. Michelle approached us with exactly that task after buying a sponsorship for Seattle Pride’s Pride in the Park at Volunteer Park.

The goal was to create an “Instagrammable Moment” that would have visitors interested and engaging with the booth at the event. After brainstorming a few concepts we decided on a build-out of a large 3D backdrop that would bring both color and impact to the scene. We were going go make a huge PRIDE sign that people could photograph and that would serve as scenery for their selfie backgrounds.

Chateau Ste. Michelle loved the idea, so we were a go! Now the issue was… how were we actually going to build this from scratch? From concept to execution was going to require a bit more effort and materials than we originally thought.

Another consideration was how to situate this onsite. The field at the park is not flat, so our concept had to stable enough to hold the letters upright without tipping over, but also ensure that the bases were big enough to weigh everything down and hold the large rainbow arrangement of flowers we wanted to display.

The ensuing work involved a few weeks of precise measuring, cutting wood, gluing down foam blocks to hold the flowers, wrapping the bases in mesh, attaching ivy wraps, mounting the letters, and building the arrangement. The photos below outline the process.

The end result was an impressive sign that would be visible from across the park. We installed the piece on the morning of the festival and tented it off for shade. People lined up straight away to see what we were working on and we even made it on a local news report! The installation was semi-viral at the festival and brought a great number of visitors to the Chateau Ste. Michelle booth. Everyone wanted their photo taken in front of the sign.

At the end of the day we came to pack it back up and we were very glad we had put the tent up over the display - it was pouring rain that evening! We carefully loaded the display back into the truck and luckily nothing was damaged or too wet to save.

The activation was so successful that Chateau Ste. Michelle approached us again for another Pride activation the following year!