Case study 04 · Casper Labs · 2019–2024
Three years on the Promenade
As Creative Director at Casper Labs I stewarded the brand across every surface for five years, and no surface was more visible than this one: branded venues at the World Economic Forum in Davos, three years running. My scope was the event brand and the spatial design of the venues themselves.
Davos, three years running
Align a global team before the paint dries
Every January during the World Economic Forum, Casper Labs ran a branded venue on the Davos Promenade. The "Blockchain Hub" in 2022 and 2023 with partners CV Labs, then "The Hub" in 2024. Days of talks each year, with speakers from Coinbase, IBM, AWS, and beyond. The venues wore the identity we'd commissioned from JKR (that story is its own study); making it work in Swiss glass and snow was ours.
The decision that made it work: I modeled every space in 3D and ran virtual walkthroughs with a team spread across the globe. Stakeholders toured the venue months before install. Approvals happened on renders instead of on-site surprises, and vendors built from elevations cut from the same model.
2022: proof the process works
The first Hub was a wedge-shaped building modeled room by room, wrapped in the red network-node identity, with an NFT gallery and selfie station downstairs. Renders first, then the built, working venue right beside them.
The frontage, as modeled. Window wrap, signage, daily-schedule board. All decided on screen, months out.
The frontage, as built. Same glass, same red, real snow-country daylight.
The main room, dollhouse view. Overhead cutaways let non-spatial stakeholders (legal, sponsors, executives) understand flow in one glance. Stage here, press wall there, red carpet routing the crowd.
The same room, standing-room only. This is what the renders were for.
The NFT gallery, planned. Frame spacing, sightlines, and label placement worked out in the model.
The gallery, occupied. Headset on, hands full. 2022 in one frame.
The whole wedge. An odd-shaped Swiss building resolved room by room. Theater, gallery, bar, media room, all placed before anyone shipped a crate.
Programming, live. Panels all day under the wall we placed in the model.
2023: the system matures
Year two turned up the graphic voltage. Casper red with lime, bolder window elevations, and production drawings vendors could build from without a phone call.
- 2023 interiors. The red path again, by now a signature, routing visitors past every partner story.
- Design you can fabricate. Panel-by-panel elevations for Swiss vendors. The unglamorous drawings that make the glamorous photos possible.
- Three days of programming. The venue earned its keep as a stage, not a billboard.
- The frontage at night, designed to read across the Promenade in a snowstorm.
The 2023 reel. The renders and elevations above, as lived: crowds on the Promenade, panels in session, the Hub at night.
2024: The Hub
Year three, rebuilt under a new name and a warmer geometric identity. Drag the sliders to compare the empty venue with the same spaces wrapped.
Wrapped
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"The Hub" frontage. Every glass panel and door mapped in 3D, so people on three continents approved a wrap for a street they never saw.
Wrapped
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Interior overview. The red path, three years running.
Wrapped
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The lounge at eye level. Walkthrough footage of exactly this view sold the layout to leadership.
The walkthrough itself. Nineteen seconds of the motion loop stakeholders toured before install. This is what "approvals happened on renders" actually looked like in the room.
The outcome
The render was the meeting
Three consecutive Forums delivered with a globally distributed team and Swiss vendors, approvals running on renders and walkthrough loops instead of red-eye flights. The photos beside the renders are the proof. What got approved on screen is what got built in the snow, and what filled to standing-room when the talks began.
Looking back: environmental design taught me that the deliverable isn't the space. It's alignment. The renders weren't presentation candy; they were the meeting.