Mangostone

Edition Three Feature
Words by: Laurens Nockels and Tony Tarquini
Location: Bristol, UK
Photo Credits: Andre Pattenden @andrepattenden

What is it that you do and how do you do it?

Laurens: In a nutshell, we make sets, models, props, sculpture, animatronic creatures – that’s the key range of our business. We essentially specialise in making unusual objects, particularly on the sculptural side, and we’re moving into doing more and more animatronics, which is an area of particular interest to us. We make a lot of replica props for productions, whether it’s specific pieces of sculpture or soft copies of props for special effects, such as an executioner’s axe, rubber mallets, a foam toilet.

We do a lot of set-building work, with Aardman Animations in particular, who will ask us to handle overspill work that they don’t have the capacity for. We’ve done a number of short films with them, including one for Greenpeace, which starred the voices of Olivia Coleman and Helen Mirren, and one for Ontario Power Generation, with Dammy the Beaver, about not swimming near dams. We made lots of little replica props and animation sets for those, but we also do full-size live action sets. Just recently, we provided the living room set for a BritBox advert. Then there are set pieces like the pilot pod for the Urban Myth Films production of War of the Worlds – essentially the interior of an enormous spaceship.