Breathing Light into History: Illuminating Beit Al-Balad’s Historic Journey

With its narrow, winding streets and 500+ year-old historic structures, Al-Balad, or “The Town,” is one of Saudi Arabia’s historical and cultural treasures. In 2018 Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman pledged significant funding for the restoration of the District. This prompted the organizers to feature the historic precinct in the activities of the 2019 Jeddah Seasons Festival.

Craft was commissioned to work on one of the most important events that took place in Al-Balad, the Kanz Al-Balad: a daily scavenger hunt leading participants on a historical journey through a light-filled installation within the old city. With just 4 weeks for design and installation, Craft provided facade lighting throughout the journey route, and specialist interior and exterior lighting for feature buildings such as:

• Projection mapping of the historic Makkah Gateway building
• Lighting design for what became known as the “Rubik’s Cube” building, an iconic artistic light installation for the festival

Craft also developed and executed:

• Design of all lighting effects
• Creative content for projection mapping
• AV design and specification
• Equipment installation + maintenance for duration of festival
• Operation for the duration of the festival
• Decommissioning following the conclusion of the festival