Henson Franklyn

2011 - Cocktail? Yes please!

Not a common request for a exhibition design and build company - Henson Franklyn was recently asked to build a Cocktail Bar within an exhibition stand. Whilst the bar was in a exhibition hall it certainly stood out among all the other more traditional exhibition stands and it attracted much comment and grabbed the attention of the delegates.

The design of the bar was a challenge as the client requested it to be a separate area from the rest of the stand. With the stand space at such a premium a physical barrier of some kind was out of the question. Eventually building the bar up a step was chosen as it created almost a separate area that didn’t minimised impact on total floor space. The result worked very well which also allowed Henson Franklyn to light the steps with hidden LEDs which added to the overall effect of the bar and keeping the Health & Safety team happy.

Intimate exhibition stands with multiple aims like this are sometimes difficult to achieve and every part of the design is created to try a maximise space. The client wanted lots of space for graphics and advertising but with space limited on the stand Henson Franklyn decided that traditional prints were not suitable. Six 32” LED flatscreen televisions were used instead and the customers graphics altered to work in a rolling presentation. To increase the impact the LED TV were rotated to a portrait format and placed back to back. When combining the LED TV stands with the canopy legs it gave a tiny stand a big presence.

The stand received much praise and HF staff might have been caught having a cheeky cocktail (after the build was finished of course!).