In a city like New York, where space is limited, creating a new public park can be quite the challenge. It’s not designing the park, or even building it, that’s so difficult; it’s finding a place to put it that’s tricky. This lack of free space, however, hasn’t prevented new parks from popping up in the Big Apple – they’ve just had to be creative in where they build them. We’ve already covered New York’s High Line, a park built along an abandoned elevated railway in Manhattan’s Lower west side, here on entertainmentdesginer.com. So if a park can be built above the city streets why not below them? That’s exactly what the Delancey Underground project is setting out to do with their proposed LowLine park under Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

Just like the High Line, the LowLine will take advantage of an abandoned railway system. In the case of the LowLine, the project’s founders, Dan Barasch and James Ramsey, have their sights set on a former trolley terminal in one of the country’s oldest neighborhoods. Just below Delancey Street lies the 60,000-square-foot Williamsburg trolley terminal, abandoned since 1948. When Ramsey and Barasch first set eyes on the disused trolley station a few years back, they fell in love with the site’s architectural details – old cobblestones, vaulted ceilings, crisscrossing tracks, and steel columns – and decided it would be the perfect place for New York’s next public park.

The Light Collection System

Of course the first question that jumps out of everyone’s mouth is: why would anyone want to build a park underground? Those who have spent even a brief amount of time on New York’s subway know that it’s dark, dank, and full of rats down there. We’re not sure what they’re planning to do about the rats and other creepy-crawlies, but Ramsey and Barasch have devised a system that will allow them to draw natural light down into the terminal. To light up the park, they propose using an optical system that will gather sunlight from the surface and disperse it underground via solar distributor dishes embedded in the ceiling. They’ve already built and tested a prototype that can transmit enough light to support trees and plants. In addition, this optical system filters out UV rays, so you’ll never have to worry about a sunburn while enjoying the natural light.

LowLine Concept Image

One of the key selling points for this park is that, since it’s underground, it could be used comfortably year round. Even during the worst winter storms, residents could go hang out at the LowLine park. There will be much more to do than just hanging out though. According to the LowLine’s Kickstarter proposal, Barasch and Ramsey hope to bring an array of services and entertainment underground, including a farmer’s market, art installations, concerts, and youth programs: all in a space they believe will be “a safe haven from the hectic feel of Delancey Street.”

The Abandoned Williamsburg Trolley Tunnel

The LowLine project is quickly gaining momentum and has already raised over $150,000 through Kickstarter. Although the MTA is interested in the project they cannot contribute any funds to it. What Barasch and Ramsey need to do now is prove to the MTA and city officials that their park is feasible. It’s obviously not as easy to imagine as the High Line, which received $20 million in donations, so they will use their first $100,000 to build a “mini LowLine” to showcase their light collection system and the site’s potential. As of now, there is no hinting at how soon we might see this project become a reality; but considering the support the project has received thus far, it might not be long before New Yorkers start spending a lot more time underground.

All Images via DelanceyUnderground.org

Audience members at this year’s Coachella Music Festival were stunned when deceased rapper Tupac Shakur appeared alongside Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg to perform two songs before vanishing into thin air. In the aftermath of the festival, we’ve been reading a lot about the Tupac “hologram”; but as any reader of entertainmentdesigner.com could tell you, that was no hologram rapping and dancing on stage. No, Tupac was not resurrected with lasers, but with one of the oldest tricks in the book: the Pepper’s Ghost illusion.

There seems to be much confusion among the media as to what exactly appeared on stage at Coachella, resulting in the misnomer “hologram” being tossed around. A hologram is a 3D image recorded and reconstructed with a laser beam. The image of Tupac at Coachella was in fact a 2D image projected onto a reflective surface in an updated version of Pepper’s Ghost.

You can see some clips of the performance featured on Jimmy Kimmel Live below, or check out the full performance here (we just wanted to give you a heads-up that there is some profanity in the full video).

While the Tupac projection was created by AV Concepts and its partner, Digital Domain Media Group (whose stock has shot through the roof since the performance), the underlying technology was developed by London-based Musion Systems Ltd. Just to make things confusing, they market their proprietary projection system as Musion Eyeliner 3D Holographic Projection, while in reality the system creates the illusion of a 3D image rather than a true holographic image.

The Musion Eyeliner system updates the reflective surface and the image source used in the original Pepper’s Ghost. Rather than employing glass as the main reflecting surface, a thin and very light-weight metalized film is placed along the front of the stage. As in the traditional Pepper’s Ghost stagings, the reflective film is installed at an angle of 45-degrees to the audience so that it will reflect any image placed below the audience. In earlier versions of this illusion, such as Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion, the glass reflects actual objects in motion. In the case of the Musion Eyeliner system, the image to be reflected is supplied by an LED screen or high-powered projector. This is a bit like the version of the Pepper’s Ghost illusion in the “Ghosts of the Library” show at the Abraham Presidential Library and Museum.

Image: Christopher Polk and Getty Images

Even with all the technology in place, AV Concepts still needed an original Tupac performance to project. This is where Digital Domain Media Group, an Oscar-winning CG house, comes into the picture. It was Digital Domain that created the animated Tupac based on old footage and a lot of input from Dr.Dre who spearheaded the whole project. Over the course of four months, Digital Domain pieced together a realistic Tupac, with Dr. Dre advising the design team on Tupac’s movements, mannerisms, and style. The result was a realistic, but ghostly-looking Tupac that performed two songs in perfect sync with Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg.

For now, Dr. Dre is claiming that the Tupac “hologram” was a one-time deal. In a video message released to dispel rumors about a tour featuring the hologram, Dr. Dre made it clear that “it was strictly for Coachella, get it right.” He does, however, leave things slightly open-ended when he goes on to say, “if a tour happens, we’ll see.”

Top Image: ubergizmo.com

There is no longer any need to wait for Halloween to visit a haunted house if you’re a resident of Mesa, Arizona. Starting tomorrow, Friday the 13^th, residents and visitors can dine year-round in a horror-themed nightclub and restaurant called Monsterland Bar & Grill. For obvious reasons, we don’t usually want to be frightened while we are eating, but Monsterland is banking on their enormous collection of memorabilia to draw in a steady crowd of horror fans.

Dinner, Drinks and a Horror Show: MyFoxPHOENIX.com

In fact, Monsterland was originally conceived of as a horror museum and not a restaurant. The restaurant/museum’s owner, Kevin Wynn, first opened the two-story, 15,000-square-foot space to the public as a haunted attraction last Halloween. Following the Halloween season, the plan was to reopen Monsterland as the area’s first year-round horror attraction and museum. However, after considering the venture’s potential, Wynn did not believe a horror museum could make it on its own. Instead of abandoning the idea altogether, he decided to transform the space into a one-of-a-kind themed restaurant.

When we say horror memorabilia, we’re not just talking about posters – this isn’t one of those theme restaurants that put up a few framed photos and call it good enough. Guests at Monsterland are actually dinning in a professional-quality haunted house. The sets throughout the dining area and downstairs haunted house attraction were designed by Wynn’s daughter and boyfriend, who he has admitted to Fox Phoenix are really the ones that are “into this stuff.” For Wynn’s daughter and her boyfriend, terrifying creations are not just a hobby. The sets are Hollywood caliber and the figures frighteningly realistic.

The dinning area is home to over 50 animatronic figures and props, guaranteeing that everyone in the restaurant will be getting a first-rate show; that is, if you don’t mind being stared down by grimacing werewolves, blood-thirsty vampires, and disemboweled zombies while you dine on Batwings or a Bleeding Heart steak. Naturally, this isn’t going to be everyone’s ideal dining environment and Wynn is the first to admit it: “Even if you’re not into it though, you’ve got a lot of eye candy here to look at. It’s not going to scare you out of your mind.” (Fox)

On the other hand, the 8,000-squre-foot haunted house downstairs may do just that. It is closed off to the public for now, but come the haunting season, the doors will be thrown open. If getting spooked is not your thing, or you are afraid of losing your meal, there are TV monitors set up in the bar and restaurant on which you can watch other guests screaming and jumping in the haunted house.

Wynn’s original intention to open a horror museum has been carried through into the restaurant, but on a smaller scale. Near the restaurant’s entrance, a tiny museum houses horror memorabilia such as posters and props, as well as fun facts about classic horror movies. What’s on display at any given moment is just a small portion of the Wynn’s collection, so guests can expect to see something new in the museum every time they come back.

We can’t think of any better way to spend Friday the 13^th!

Want to learn one of the biggest secrets of all time? We can’t tell you ourselves, but we can point you in the right direction. The secret that we are talking about won’t bring you eternal youth, reveal the future, or anything of that nature. What we are talking about is the mysterious combination of “natural ingredients” that gives Coca-Cola its trademark flavor. Up until last December, the original copy of the Coca-Cola secret formula was held in the main vault of Atlanta’s SunTrust Bank; today the formula resides in a new vault on display at the World of Coca-Cola museum in downtown Atlanta. Much more than just a heavy-duty vault to stare at, the Vault of the Secret Formula exhibit is an interactive exploration of one of the most notorious trade secrets in the world.

This is not the first time that we’ve featured the interactive handiwork of Second Story here on entertainmentdesigner.com; in previous articles we’ve taken a look at exhibits they designed for the Museum at Bethel Woods and the Adler Planetarium. With their latest project for Coca-Cola, they’ve come up with even more ways to embed interactive technology in a museum experience. The twelve activities that comprise the “Vault of the Secret Formula” are described by Second Story as “flowing from the two aspects of the secret formula: the secrecy and mystery surrounding it, and the fun that comes from simply enjoying the product.” When visitors pass through the vault door into the exhibit, they will enter a world where fact and fiction are often indistinguishable: just as they have been in the mythology surrounding the secret Coca-Cola formula.

"Secret Formula Security System Drawer"

Visitors will often be surprised to find out that they are part of the exhibit. The “Secret Formula Security System Drawer,” for example, contains a series of drawers in which security screens are embedded. When a visitor opens a drawer, they will discover that they are being filmed by an overhead camera. This concealed Microsoft Kinect depth-sensing camera then turns the visitor into a data point cloud to emphasize the theme of security in the history of the secret formula. As they watch the screen they’ll notice that a mysterious character pops up behind them, but when they turn around no one is there. This elusive figure in black reappears again and again throughout the exhibit. Over at “Reactive Shadows,” an immersive experience in which visitors use their shadows to reveal hidden messages, the mysterious figure periodically appears and interacts with guests’ shadows. What we never know is whether this shadowy person is trying to help us find the secret formula or prevent us from discovering it.

"Bottle Imposters"

Other activities focus on the physical properties of the soft drink, such as carbonation and the bottle. The “Bubble-izer” again utilizes Microsoft Kinect technology to transform the visitor into bubbles and fizz as they approach a screen. We are particularly fond of the “Bottle Imposters” display for the reason that it was created with one of our favorite special effects techniques: the Pepper’s Ghost Illusion. This series of circular light boxes chronicles the history of the Coca-Cola bottle and the soft drink’s many imposters. Within one of these circles, a 3D show takes place in which knock-off labels hover around a Coca-Cola bottle and try to adhere to it before being destroyed in a number of humorous ways.

So maybe you won’t actually learn the secret formula, but you will undoubtedly have a blast searching for it. You can always just look up the formula on Wikipedia anyways!

After covering the new Ferrari Museum last week, we wanted to find out which other sports car manufacturers have a museum of their own. Alongside Ferrari, Porsche is one of the most recognizable names on and off the racetrack. As one of the world’s most successful automobile manufacturers, it comes as no surprise that the German company has invested in a state-of-the-art museum. Like the Ferrari Museum, the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart, Germany, is just as much about making an architectural statement as it is about preserving the history of these legendary cars.

Porsche first opened a museum in 1976, just down the road from the Porsche factory in the Zuffenhausen district of Stuttgart. At this time, the museum was considerably smaller than the current version and could only host about 20 exhibits. Even though the museum has undergone a dramatic transformation since the early days, the idea behind it is still the same. Rather than simply keep their vehicles lined up behind glass, Porsche created a “rolling museum.” The intention is to keep every vehicle in running condition and periodically take them out for road shows. Classic Porsches, such as the 550 A Spyder and the 356 Carrera Abarth GT, are taken as far away as Australia to participate in classic car races. According to the museum, “the classic vehicles in the museum’s collection are serving the purpose for which they were built in the first place: driving!”

In 2004, Porsche decided it was time to upgrade their museum and held a design competition to which 170 architectural firms submitted proposals. Out of these 170 submissions, Porsche selected a design submitted by the Viennese firm, Delugan Meissi Associated Architects. Unlike the previous museum, the architecture of the new building, with its bold and sensuous shapes, reflects the Porsche design philosophy. If one had to choose a single word to describe it, “monolithic” would fit the bill. The massive white exhibition hall “floats” atop the 21,000 cubic meters of concrete that make up the underground garage and ground floor. The building, which appears to hover like a spaceship, was designed as such so that visitors would be drawn up from the ground level into the Porsche universe.

The all white interior of the exhibition hall reflects the dynamic design of the various Porsches without detracting from them. With over 300 perfectly restored Porsches on site, there is little else needed to enthrall the car fanatic. While the cars do most of the talking, just the right amount of media is interspersed throughout the hall to provide historical insight into these machines. For the kids, the museum has devised the “Museum Rallye”: a game in which children discover the answers to a series of questions in the details of the car. And for those of you that no longer have the energy of a 10-year-old, try refueling at the Boxenstopp and Coffee Bar.

Just a warning: unless you arrived at the museum in a Porsche, an afternoon in front of these magnificent specimens might very well arouse a little bit of car envy.

It’s no stretch to say that Japan is home to some of the strangest themed restaurants in the world (Cannibalistic Sushi is just the tip of the iceberg!). But it is also home to plenty of unique establishments that won’t gross you out. In fact, the one we have in mind for today’s post is a totally relaxing experience. A café full of hammocks seems like a no-brainer, but we really hadn’t seen anything like this put into practice until we came across Tokyo’s Mahiko Mano Hammock Café.

The Mahiko Mano café is such a simple idea that it makes you wonder why there aren’t more of these around. This café is arranged like any other except that all chairs have been replaced by hammocks in a variety of different colors and sizes. There are various arrangements of hammocks that cater to groups or just the single coffee drinker. Obviously, eating a full meal might prove a bit difficult while reclining in your hammock, but the café does offer a menu of small plates featuring eclectic Japanese cuisine.

The trouble with hammocks is that they put people to sleep. This is certainly one reason a café owner might think twice before stringing up a bunch of hammocks in their café. In order to keep visitors from passing an entire day in their comfortable café, Mahiko Mano enforces a time limit of 90 to 120 minutes per customer. Still, a couple of hours in a comfy hammock with a warm drink should be plenty of time to revive the weary tourist.

While the idea of a hammock café is simple enough, there is more to this place than meets the eye. Mahiko Mano actually doubles as a show room for the Japanese maker of designer hammocks, Hammock 2000; so if you happen to fall in love with the hammock you just spent your afternoon napping in, you can take it home with you for the right price. Aside from just selling hammocks, the trio of friends that founded Hammock 2000 are trying to promote a ritual of relaxation in a culture that is often considered to be very strict and uptight. One of the company’s founders, Masafumi Miura, proposes that the “dependency on futons and beds contributed somehow to the rigidifying of people’s backs, hearts and minds.” He believes that long ago the Japanese people relied on hammocks to keep dry and warm in a very damp country: “A futon on the floor,” says Miura, “traps the humidity and chill, whereas a hammock will stay dry and comfortable and be easy to store in the confines of the tiny Japanese living space.”

After reading about the philosophy of Hammock 2000, it becomes clear that Mahiko Mano is more than just another peculiar dining experience from Japan. While on the surface it’s a great place to catch a quick snooze, in a broader sense it is a well-designed comment on the sleeping habits of an entire culture.

The name Ferrari is known the world over, but what do we know about the man behind the legendary Italian sports car? Enzo Ferrari, who founded Scuderia Ferrari in 1929 to sponsor race car drivers, preferred to keep out of the public eye. Only rarely would he grant interviews, and when he did so, he always kept his shades on (we do know he was a very stylish man). Although he was a man of few words, he spoke volumes with his iconic designs. With the opening of Museo Casa Enzo Ferrari (the Enzo Ferrari Museum), car enthusiasts can now get a behind-the-scenes look at how Ferrari transformed the world of sports cars with his innovative approach to speed and style.

Museo Casa Enzo Ferrari is located in Ferrari’s hometown of Modena, Italy. The 18 million euro project was not officially sponsored by the Ferrari company, located a few miles away in Maranello. Instead, the museum was commissioned by an alliance of civic groups seeking to increase tourism in the area; other than the museum, the city is primarily known for its vinegar and 12th-century cathedral. The alliance of civic groups did however follow a Ferrari tradition of hiring star architects to design their buildings (the Ferrari compound in Maranello features buildings by Renzo Piano, Massimiliano Fuksas, and Ateliers Jean Nouvel). Museo Casa Enzo Ferrari was originally designed by Jan Kaplicky of Future Systems back in 2003. Unfortunately, Kaplicky passed away suddenly in 2009, and the project was taken over by his former colleague at Future Systems, Andrea Morgante. As a result of these circumstances, the Enzo Ferrari museum, in addition to commemorating the achievements of Ferrari, also stands as a monument to the life and work of Kaplicky.

The museum’s two buildings play Ferrari’s humble beginnings and his cars’ later status as a symbol of luxury against each other. The first of these buildings is the actual birthplace of Enzo Ferrari, a simple brick building with “Officina Meccanic Alfredo Ferrari” painted across its side. Inside of Ferrari’s first home, visitors will encounter memorabilia from his life as a young man in Modena, a race car driver, and finally the accomplished builder. It is here that visitors will have access to a side of Ferrari rarely seen by the public through the museum’s collection of pictures, unpublished films, and mementoes.

Enveloping the old country home is the sleek exhibition gallery designed by Kaplicky. The gallery’s striking yellow, curved roof, and series of vents all pay homage to Ferrari’s designs. Since this unusual looking building arrived in the traditional town, it has been dubbed by locals as the “hood.” The building’s hood-like appearance is of course intentional; according to Morgante, the gallery is “an oversize crossbreed of car design, architecture and the most advanced engineering.” Inside the gallery, the history of both Ferrari and Modena car racing are told through the cars that made it all happen. Plenty of audio and video is integrated into the numerous displays of both Ferraris and the Alfa Romeos that Enzo first worked with, bringing the rich history of Italian racing to life within what Kaplicky called a “car as museum.” This colorful play between architecture and automobile will no doubt mark Museo Case Enzo Ferrari as a pilgrimage for car fanatics and architecture aficionados alike.

Today we return to Singapore, the Southeast Asian country that has brought us many new attractions in recent months, such as Transformers: The Ride at Universal Studios Singapore, The Wanderlust Hotel, and the largest animatronic creatures in the world. This hotbed of entertainment is also home to an interesting new museum called the ArtScience Museum at the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Resort. As you may’ve noticed,  it is not a museum of  “Art and Science,” but the singular discipline of “ArtScience.” This term is so new that it doesn’t even have a Wikipedia entry, which might lead some to believe that it doesn’t even exist. However, after a little detective work, it became clear that ArtScience is indeed an emerging field which unites two disciplines often believed to be incompatible. As the world’s first ArtScience museum, the ArtScience Museum at Marina Bay Sands was created to teach visitors about the qualities that unite art and science.

The very first lesson comes in the form of the museum itself; the lotus-shaped building, designed by Moshe Safdie, is both work of art and technical achievement. Floating above the bay on a system of pillars, the 50,000 square foot museum is referred to as “The Welcoming Hand of Singapore.” Each upward pointing finger of the building contains a different gallery illuminated by skylights situated in the “fingertips.” These skylights, in conjunction with the curved walls of the gallery, are a powerful light source and diminish the museum’s reliance on traditional lighting. The unique shape of the museum further contributes to the museum’s sustainability goals by collecting rainwater in its bowl-shaped roof and reusing the water in the building’s restrooms.

Aerial View of the ArtScience Museum

Primarily, the museum hosts touring exhibitions that focus on the overlap of science and art. There is a broad spectrum of topics that fall within this overlap as evidenced by some of the exhibitions which have already passed through. Since the museum opened in February 2011, they’ve featured exhibitions on Van Gogh, Salvador Dali, the Silk Road, Cartier Watches, and Genghis Kahn. There are currently two traveling shows residing at the ArtScience museum. The first, Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition, features a collection of 275 authentic artifacts from the doomed cruise ship; and the second, Andy Warhol: 15 Minutes Eternal, brings over 260 works by the famous pop artist to Singapore for the first time.

Media Wall in 'ArtScience: A Journey Through Creativity"

The centerpiece of the museum is the permanent exhibition, ArtScience: A Journey Through Creativity. Divided into three different sections – Curiosity, Inspiration, and Expression - this exhibition explores the creative process that runs through both artistic creation and scientific discovery. As guests explore each gallery in this exhibit, they are encouraged to contribute to an evolving multi-media canvas designed to showcase the creativity inherent in everyone and, as the museum puts it, “the power of human beings to harness inspiration to make the world a better place.”

When happy hour rolls around you probably don’t head to your local church. But in Portland, Maine, that is exactly where you’ll find some of the best cocktails in town. The only service you’ll find in this church, however, is table service. The Chestnut Street United Methodist Church, which was abandoned in 2006, is now one of Portland’s premier restaurants. After two years of meticulous restoration, this pre-civil war church was reborn as Grace restaurant in 2009.

The Chestnut Street church dates back to 1856 and is an important example of the Gothic Revival style of architecture, earning it a spot on the National Register of Historic Places. In fact, it is one of just a few remaining examples of this style in Portland due to a large fire in 1866 that destroyed so many buildings of the era. After the church was abandoned in 2006, it caught the eyes of restaurateurs Peter and Anne Verrill, who had recently achieved success with their Foreside Tavern in nearby Falmouth, Maine. They decided to purchase the old church in 2007 and began a two year restoration project during which they learned firsthand the challenges of historic preservation.

Since the building is on the National Register of Historic Places, no work could be done without official approval. This often meant months of delays before a seemingly simple task could be executed. According to Anne, “It took us three months to get the right color of mortar.” The historic preservation guidelines required that the building appear as if no actual work had been done to repair the mortar, which meant that the Verrills had to come up with ten different color samples before they were given the go-ahead. Two million dollars and two years later, they were finally ready to open one of Portland’s most divine restaurants.

If you’ve been to church before, then the environment will be familiar. Massive stained glass windows and the vaulted ceiling give the place a peaceful and spiritual quality; but the centerpiece of Grace is the twenty-two foot diameter circular bar on the first floor. Designed by Tivi Design, the bar is made up of six concrete sections – each weighing about 500 lbs. – that were built in Colorado and then shipped out to Maine. From your seat at this heavy-duty bar, you can order cocktails with names like “dust to dust,” “holier than thou,” and “redemption.”

Throughout the rest of the 175-seat restaurant, one will discover many small touches that address the building’s heritage. All of the napkin rings were made out of parts from the original organ, while the knives recall the shape of the church’s tall and narrow lancet windows. Details such as these are all part of the Verrill’s intention to create a dining experience that is permeated by grace on every level. It was the word “grace,” and its many possible interpretations, that inspired the restaurant, which according to Anne, “is everything from beauty down to the actual saying of grace at the table.

Ever wondered what it would be like to step inside your favorite TV show? Showtime figured that most people would answer yes to that question and decided to make it possible by creating the Showtime House. This “house” is unique for a couple of reasons. To begin with, it is spread over three penthouses at the top of Manhattan’s luxurious Cassa Hotel and Residences; but even more interesting than the house’s location is what’s inside the penthouses. In 2010, Showtime brought together a team of top-notch interior designers from around the world to create a series of rooms inspired by seven of their most popular TV shows.

'Weeds' Lounge

The seven TV shows that inspired the rooms at the Showtime House are: The Borgias, The Big C, Weeds, Californication, Dexter, Nurse Jackie, and the United States of Tara. If you’ve ever caught any of these shows, you’ll know that they each have a very distinctive style. However, the job assigned to the 14 interior designers wasn’t to copy each show exactly, but to interpret the style and themes, and then weave them into a design that is innovative in its own right. Except for The United States of Tara, which was translated into a loft and roof, each TV show was allotted two rooms.

Californication: A State of Mind

As you can tell from the pictures in this article, the designers channeled the characters’ personalities into everything throughout the room, from the furniture to the wallpaper. In the Californication room entitled “Californication: A State of Mind” we see mirrored floors and walls covered in jumbled up letters. This confusing atmosphere where letters seem to be everywhere, but don’t form any words, reflects perfectly Hank Moody’s (played by David Duchovny) writer’s block.

Dexter's Refuge

Over in Dexter’s (of the show Dexter) “Refuge” we get another psychological portrait. Dexter is a blood pattern analyst for the Miami Police Department by day and serial killer by night. Not surprisingly, his refuge is a little on the creepy side. Yet, he is a conflicted serial killer, so we see in the elegant design a balance between his killer tendencies and his desire to maintain a normal home life.

'The Borgias' Media Room

Technical innovation was also an important element in the design of the Showtime House rooms. In particular, the “Media Room” in The Borgias section used interactive technology to immerse guests in the mood set by the TV show. The room, drenched in blood red light, features projectors and speakers that respond to the visitors’ movement through the room. Upstairs, on the United States of Tara roof, a ghost-like Tara (who suffers Dissociate Identity Disorder) follows guests as they pass in front of the digital mirror. Meanwhile, over at The Big C “Clarity Lounge and Contemplation Room,” a 3D TV has been set into a wall of living plants.

'The Big C' Clarity Lounge and Contemplation Room

Unfortunately this version of the Showtime House is now closed, but we look forward to the next edition. Until then, you can still take a virtual tour of the rooms over at the Showtime House website.