BACK // BBC
The long-awaited return of comedy duo Mitchell and Webb kicked off with this 6 part mysterious drama series. After the death of his father, Laurie, 42-year-old Stephen is set to take over the family business, the John Barleycorn pub, in Stroud, Gloucestershire. His plans are interrupted when Andrew, a former foster child briefly raised by Stephen's parents, returns to his life eager to renew his relationship with the family.
Based at Pinewood Studios we took over K stage and purpose-built a pub to base our story around. Actually, we built four pubs! We had a modern-day pub, a badly fire-damaged pub, a refurbed post-fire pub and a flashback to the 80s pub for good measure.
How much pub furniture can one Set Dec decorate with? You might well ask! It turns out, quite a lot. With a total of 4 tonnes of cut logs and a whopping 126 dining tables (and 885 chairs), our pubs were up and running and ready for camera. The design included an under stairs office and back-of-house kitchen, all of which had a well-thought-through redesign to propel our story.
Together with multiple domestic sets on location and a huge outdoor summer festival set featuring fairground rides and plenty of food stalls, this was a brilliantly enjoyable project to work on.
