A peek into the second season of the fantastical series, where travel is not limited to physical reality! Set Decorator Halina Siwolop SDSA, describes how she, Production Designer Michael Wylie and their creative crews approached the series...

“Brutalist/futuristic architecture meets 1970’s groovy design—we had a blast!”
 
 
...from Set Decorator Halina Siwolop SDSA...

Working on LEGION was an exhilarating and amazing experience.  On the first day of the job, I walked into our offices where the words “Uncanny Valley” were plastered on the ceiling and walls.  That set the stage for our design work, designing environments where things aren’t always what they initially appear to be. What did that mean for the art department and set decoration? My production designer, Michael Wylie, would always tell me, “Not everything needs to make sense” and to just have fun.
 
The concept of this world was to never let the viewer know where the characters were. Are we in the future? The past? This is part of the deception that permeated the overall storyline. For the set dec team, this meant that we brought in design elements that, indeed, sometimes didn’t make sense and/or pushed the edge of reality. To heighten the idea of not knowing where we are, I brought in Eastern European elements, such as telephones and switch plates, and then focused on 1970’s design elements. We mixed antiques into futuristic settings, brought in obsessive collections, and as always, mixed patterned fabrics and wallpapers in a pleasing yet somewhat compulsive manner.
 
In the first season, you find out that the main character, David, is not crazy and is released from the insane asylum. Now he is forced to view the world with a new awareness as he journeys through an insane world.
 


When the production of LEGION was relocated to Los Angeles from Canada, it gave us the opportunity to create a whole new world within this insanity. We really had no limitations to the quirkiness that we could bring to the design process, which was refreshing and difficult at the same time. Sometimes I would want to make sense of something and Wylie would gently remind me that we are creating sets for characters that are from a comic book and, again, to just have fun.

How many times do you hear that and actually get to do that? 
 




Editor’s note:
Set Decorator Halina Siwolop SDSA would like to acknowledge the SDSA Business Members,
particularly those with whom she worked on this season of LEGION, including:


 
History for Hire
Practical Props
Omega Cinema Props
Warner Bros.Studios
Advanced Liquidators
Lennie Marvi's Propheaven
Faux Library
Ob*Jects
Universal Studios Property
RC Vintage/Alley Cats


Hollywood Studio Gallery
Alpha Companies Motion Picture Rentals
EC Props