Australia’s most exclusive charity event Gold Dinner 2021 was this year held in an airport hangar right on the tarmac at Sydney’s Mascot Airport.
500 of Australia’s most prominent film, television and business personalities attended the $1,500-a-head ‘Gold Dinner’ to raise money for the Sydney Children’s Hospital and in one night raised $4.8 million.
This year the glamorous event was themed and set in the golden age of air travel with large aircraft passing directly by the clear marquee venue on their way to take off or after landing.
With high-security clearance requirements, a 48-hour window to get in do the show and get out, Covid safe practices, a remote location not near any amenities or regular things like a loading dock or shops and extremely cold weather it was a very fun challenge for all in involved.
“Then the weather got even more interesting and the event took place on the coldest night in Sydney since 1872!” added lighting designer Ziggy Ziegler. “So a large number of gas and space heaters had to be brought onsite to both keep people warm and stop equipment from getting too cold and ending up damaged or failing.”
Buses brought guests past a gorgeous chrome DC3 passenger plane to the arrivals lounge where they then boarded into the main terminal for dinner. During dinner, they got to listen to Ben Lee, BudJerah and Masked Wolf. After dinner guests moved into the departure lounge where they got a special in the round performance by Sneaky Sound System.
Ziggy’s rig consisted of two ETC Source IV Lustr profiles, ten Elation 6 Bar LED strips, 12 x IP65 WW/CW LED floods, 16 x Martin MAC700 Profiles, four Claypaky Alpha Profiles, 12 x Claypaky Mythos, 28 x Martin Rush MH4 beams, eight Martin RUSH MH6 washes, 32 x Martin MAC Aura, six ShowPRO Colliders, 16 x Astera AX5 Triple Pars, two Look Solutions Unique hazers and an MA Lighting grand MA2 light for control.
Resolution X Sydney provided all truss and lights, TDC all video and Norwest Productions for audio. The event was designed and produced by TEAM EVENT.
“The lights were all chosen to be robust, lightweight, have practical power draw and be capable of working in cold weather,” said Ziggy. “It was also during what was one of the busiest weeks equipment wise in Sydney in the past year and a half. They all performed admirably with no issues or failures during the night.”
