We are no longer strangers to the barbie photoshoots and their accompanying behind the scenes breakdowns, so let’s dive in head first! Since this hypothetical pool is a shallow one, don’t break your necks just yet. Let me reintroduce the team!
My mom, dad, Mike Kidd (sister’s fiancé), sister Shannon and some random caucasian.
Ten years ago, if someone had asked me what I thought I would be doing on christmas of 2013, building a strip club in my living room would have probably charted pretty low. But unlike an infomercial clairvoyant, I would have been wrong! I can’t express how excited I am about this new family tradition of building unique sets to shoot a self-destructive barbie in. This time around, we decided that barbie needed a part-time gig to pay her cellphone bill while she was in “med school”. Hey, it’s only temporary! No seriously… the walls are held up by masking tape.
We start off with an idea, one that will tell a story through set design and atmosphere. Since barbie is generally happy, we have to express her via poses (and in this case, pasties). While eating lunch with my mom and sister, I was trying to explain the club that I had imagined. The connecting room wasn’t as easy to explain as I thought, so I took to the pen and drew a sketch on an old carnival cruise lines note pad.
Thanks for the drafting classes mom! #architect
You can see an overhead view of the set to be constructed, the tv with rabbit ear antennas looking thing is camera and field of view. There were more Ken’s in the original idea, but we will get to that. This gave me enough of an idea to start gathering materials. I measured barbie (12”), and started to scale the room to her height while keeping it a manageable size. Much like last time, I forgot to take a picture of the uncut/raw materials. But this will give you an idea of what we are working with.
Color choices.. always a fun part of the process. I knew ahead of time I wanted it to be a dingy strip club vs. our vibrant color choices for the bathroom shoot. I knew the lights would bring the colorfulness, I didn’t want our set to compete with that. This red is actually the color of the shutters and doors on my parents house (Strip club burgundy).
Test stage! I wanted to see how the size of the stage would affect the rest of the space we had to set dress and place our actors.
Next, I used a jig-saw to cut out the doorway for the connecting room. I also added a false wall to give the illusion of depth. This was cut to height of barbie as well.
I wasn’t lying, tape holds these things together. Until it doesn’t. And then I have a neat pile of wood on my living room floor.
The club was originally called “Splinters”
Time to get fancy! My dad stained the chair railing to give it a more vintage, classic bar feel. These get a line of wood glue and tape to hold them in place while they dry. I need 2 hands to take photos, no time for that.
Trim has been added, and stage re-inserted.
This seemed like a good time to check in with our project historian, Felix (Tricia). She approved the building plans, and accuracy.
Design discussion over Golden Corral. (photo of Tricia on right taken by Brandon Powell)
Next, I cut down some thin plexi-glass to serve as the stage floor. This is done by scoring the plexi with the knife shown below. After several passes, the plexi snaps in half.
After the stage was cut down, we started to construct the railing that goes around it to prevent a barbie slip & die. We did this with a hacksaw and a vice, just like the other small trim pieces. We used these little flat head plugs as the base for our railing.
Applying our railing system. It was painted with krylon chrome spray paint. Looks pretty convincing!
Stage is set! Also pictured, our bar. I cut this from scrap pieces of the wall luan. I had originally wanted make the stage out of a mirror, but my dad suggested that we make the stage out of plexi-glass so that we could put lights under it to uplight our dancer. Apparently he has been to more upscale strip clubs than I have!
Test lighting with a little help from a patron.
The pole. This was cut from a dowel rod and painted with the same chrome paint. Here, Mike was testing out the pole's flexibility with our barbie attached. We had to make sure she wasn't going to bring down the house once the set was finished.
Like this...
My dad adds a coat of stain over our gray flooring, this adds a dirtier, darker feel. After it dries, tables are installed.
Details and Lighting:
Now that our building has passed inspection, its the small things that are going to make this club come to life. We take a family trip to the Dollar Tree.
A quick breakdown of how we spent $22 on several key items and lighting.
- New years party beads (curtains)
- headphones (phone/cables)
- toothbrush caps (trashcan)
- 6 clip-on book reading lights (wall sconces)
- marker set (various)
- 3 finger light led packs (par-can lighting)
- lip balm (caps were used as stool seats)
- tape/glue (holding it together)
My sister came up with the idea to use beads instead of the velvet curtains we originally intended. These looked great because of the reflective surface. Each strand is held up by a clear thumbtack. I photoshopped a few stripper silhouettes from a royalty free site, printed them out and made some wall art to jazz up the club. You can see where our toothbrush cap is going.. a little silver paint, and we have a trash can!
Speaking of throwing things away, let's take a look at this guys pile of ones. Trust me, she isn't going to use those to better herself. We have an obsession with little trashcans, Shannon is particularly good at making them. The little beer bottles? These are clear thumbtacks colored with brown marker :)
While we were at the Dollar Tree, my sister found a small pack of lip shaped hair clips. She was thinking about using them as decorations when her an my mom came up with calling the club "Lips". Yes, my family is pretty clever ;) Mom starts on the sign!
On the set construction end, we thought we were mostly finished, but a few more items would need to be built from the left over wood to complete our set. Mike suggested that we add an ATM. Fair enough! I cut out a pay phone to go in the back hallway as well. These were done with a jigsaw/hacksaw combination. The ATM was painted silver, drawn all over with a sharpie and had plexi-glass added for the screen and the sign. I drew a reverse sketch of the ATM letters so that light would later shine through. The pay phone was pretty much the same thing, my mom made a little yellow-pages book that we could hang from it using bailing wire. The "phone" is the headphone jack cut off from our Dollar Tree set.
One last little details picture before we move onto lighting. As you can see, our Munchkin is fond of Apple-tinis. Clear thumbtack with green sharpie. We also made little ashtrays out of standard brass tacks with the pins removed. We threw a few bottles on the ground near the trashcan, but my mom suggested that physics would make for broken bottles. And broken bottles were made with thumbtacks and a hammer! Again, a few details that were added to the lost art section.
After seeing the reading lights (wall sconces), I liked what they were doing, but they were a little too harsh for my taste. I used a red sharpie on the lenses to gel them, and take the intensity down a little.
Here is a general setup of our lights. A few things changed up for the main shoot to accommodate our dancer, but you can see the simple/cheap layout.
About an hour before the shoot, Andy Bell and his wife Ashley Bell came over to steal the limelight. But I must give credit where credit is due, Andy held this backlight so perfectly, that he is solely responsible for how the shoot turned out.
Lastly, we have our lead actress to address. Dress... Undress? Shannon made her tassels and thong from ribbon and electrical tape. She's ready to break some hearts.
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