Halloween

Halloween is kind of a big deal at work. I've been with the company for over 8 years and each year it gets bigger and bigger and this year was no exception. It started with everyone dressing up as usual. Then people would decorate their desk to go along with their costume. To each department coming up with a theme and decorating the department and the people of the department dressing accordingly to the theme. Usually they try to keep the theme a secret for as long as they can. It's been like that for at least the last 3-4 years. This years the Art Department's theme was Alice in Wonderland. For maximum effect we decided to us the Walt Disney version and not the original version by Lewis Carroll's. Kind of a bummer, because the book version was way more creepy and fitting for Halloween. But our goal was to win the Best Decorated Department Award and we wanted to make sure everyone was blown away by our theme. Since everyone has probably seen Alice in Wonderland at some point in their life, we decided to use that as our outline. The idea was as you walked through the department, we would tell the story of Alice in Wonderland. Starting with the Rabbit hole. One of things I wanted to do with the telling of the story was incorporating all the senses. Taste, Touch, Sight, Smell, Hearing.
Sight is easy, The decorations will do that. All of the graphics we printed. All of the stuff we made. The dry ice in tea pots to make it look like steam.
Hearing was the next thing. I took sound clips from the movie and had them playing. As you walked into the rabbit hole you would hear the strange sounds Alice heard as she fell. Next room was the Flower Forest with the Flowers singing Golden Afternoon. And finally the Tea party with Unbirthday music.
Taste was next. Since Alice eats and drinks stuff in the movie and she either grows or shrinks depending on what she is eating or drinking. We had like cruppets made and little cups of Kool-Aid for people to eat and drink. I would have like to had tea to drink at the Tea party but that would probably had not been safe with the dry ice. I would have hated to see someone get burned on the ice.
Touch was a little harder. But I guess all the props could be touched.
Smell all I could come up with was brewing tea and coffee.

Since we were on a limited budget and limited space some of the story had to be cut. So we focused on the high points. Entering the Rabbit Hole. Alice's journey in what I called the Flower forest. Of course the Mad Hatter's Tea Party. The hedge maze ending at the Queen of Heart's Castle.

Here are the photo's, finally, of the Art Department's Alice in Wonderland.
(Keep in mind I had to use the flash, otherwise you would not see much.)

So with out further ado...














With Flash


Without Flash
































































































































...and the fruits of our labor pays off. This year we finally won the Prize of Best Decorated Department.