Christmas Designs

Starred Grid

Sean Bolinger from Christian Faith Center in Federal Way, WA brings us this design for their 2013 Christmas show. (Originally posted March 2014)

Since they do their show live between two campuses, they needed to create a set that looked similar between both campuses. They stocked up pre-lit christmas trees over the past few years that made up the bulk of the stage. They go to Wal-mart on Black Friday and buy the trees on sale—not the best quality, but they work great on the stage.

But they needed to come up with a large center piece that could be duplicated on both stages. So they made a star out of plywood and put C-9 christmas light bulbs through the wood. They drilled holes smaller than the widest part of the bulb, with a 7/8″ paddle bit, and screwed it in from the back to hold it in place. They wired the light bulbs so that they could solo the cross on the inside of the star for a few special moments during the show. Then they framed the star with LED strip lights to make it stand out.

Their bigger star was 20′ wide and 24′ tall. The smaller star was 12′ wide and 16′ tall.

They spent $2000 to create both stars that were up from the beginning of December through mid-January. Afterwards they re-purposed the LED and Christmas lights for other stage projects.

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Bouncing Bars Curved Wall

5 responses to “Starred Grid”

  1. Brandon Cook says:

    Ingenuity! I love it. Great work

  2. Cameron says:

    Thanks for posting that video. You guys put together a great program! Watched all the way through.

  3. David says:

    Great job on this Christmas star! I am interested in doing something similar this year. How did you attach the plywood pieces together? How did you hang the star?

    Thanks!

    • Sean says:

      We pieced it together with 2×4’s on the back, just screwed them in from the front. We built it in three pieces and lifted it up and assembled it as we lifted. We lifted with a 1000lb motor hoist that we left attached at the top and then secured the bottom to the stage deck with 2×4’s and screws to keep it from swinging.

  4. David Butler says:

    Thanks for the response. Where did you order you LED rope lights from? Did you control them from your house lighting board or remotely?
    Thanks!

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