lord of the rings nazgul installation

'design office theming'

Picture this… its 2003, you have just seen the World Premiere of the Lord of the Rings, Return of the King. You are attending a premiere after party inside an arena that has been transformed into a scene from the movie, complete with castle doors, stone wall’s and even a giant petal covered tree. Sitting on a balcony above the crowd of two thousand, a couple of Nazgul are crouching, like statues observing the festivities below. Suddenly the music stops and some screeches ring out. The Nazgul are awakening, their wings open and they are starting to rise up. They come swooping down over the crowd. Then disappear in the distance behind a huge curtain.

A wingspan of 12 meters and a body length of 13meters they were a culmination of 3mths work by Simon Hames of Izzat Design. Simon together with Chris Covich and a small team designed and fabricated these two Nazgul specifically for the premiere party.

Years later, the phone rings asking us to reinstate one of these creatures to hang in a design studio as a piece of office theming.

The Nazgul models are made of lightweight sheet foam, with an aluminium and carbon fibre armature. The skin has been heat pressed into a mould to achieve the scaled texture.