CJ Walters from Revive in Williamstown, KY brings us this Walking Dead-themed stage design.
This stage design was based on a sermon series they were having that had the “Walking Dead” theme. They wanted to go with an abandoned prison scene to reflect the TV series.
After drawing it out and planning their main focal points of the stage, they began just to put it together and add details as they went. Their budget for this series was less than $100. As it was an abandoned theme, they didn’t have to have new looking items and were able to find most of the materials laying around people’s houses and barns. After it was all said and done, they spent a little over $30 for the entire set for screws and a few pipe fittings.
The truck was borrowed from a friend of the church and the fence was borrowed from a local fence company. Misc tires and barrels were borrowed from a local auto shop and the main material they used were pallet-like container tops. These panels were one of their favorite things to use. They look like a regular pallet but do not have the weight. Instead of a bottom they have a simple 1x on the back to hold the boards together.
The set focal points were the truck that they wanted to appear as if it came through the wall. It took 8 grown men to inch it thing into the sanctuary…very heavy, but the reward was great.
The two guard towers were built out of 2×4’s and those before-mentioned pallet tops. They added the hand rails (1.25″ PVC) and some windows they had at the church. After the main points were in, they added barb wire, barrels, tires and a battery charger was hooked up to the truck headlights to make them flash. The main entrance into the sanctuary was also themed out using some old doors out of a grocery store and some more pallets. The set was really easy to build and was done mostly in 1 night.
The quick build allowed them to add more details like a school bus that was used out front of the church as a billboard to promote the series.
When I saw the headline of this design, I was like how is this going to look like? Great execution – I like the contrast of the tv series and the church stage! Who would of thought of combining the two!?
Thank you! We love playing off of movies, tv shows, etc. it was a fun build because it was a little out of the box.
Your work it’s amazing and your budget it’s more amazing too. Last year we do a similar series, but we don’t decorate our stage because we do many weddings in our stage. We ambient the series make up some young people as a Zombie. (I am drama teacher and teach makeup as a Zombie was one of my class teaching) the series called Despierta a la Vida: (Wakeup to the life) I congrats you, your stage it’s beautiful and very assertive to the series.
Thank you!