Designing the Olympics for Television: CTV's Vancouver 2010
How Patrick Larsen designed CTV's broadcast environment for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games — a BDA Gold winner and Canadian Gemini Award–nominated set.
CTV's Vancouver 2010 anchor desk — a circular timber-and-glass podium ringed by the Olympic rings, framed by a panoramic window onto Burrard Inlet and the North Shore mountains. Design by Patrick Larsen.
For the 2010 Winter Olympics, I designed the broadcast environment for CTV — Canada's host broadcaster. When a network covers a Games, its studio becomes one of the most-watched rooms in the country for two weeks straight.
A set built for a marathon
Olympic broadcast is endurance design. Hours of live coverage a day, for more than two weeks. Dozens of presenters and guests. Every camera angle has to work, morning show to late-night wrap. It can't have an off day.
The main desk under a chandelier of illuminated Olympic rings, looking out across Canada Place — a Vancouver landmark used as living broadcast scenery. Design by Patrick Larsen.
A fireside counterpoint
Next to the main anchor desk, I built a second zone — a fireside lounge with a stone hearth and white leather chairs, for longer interviews and analysis. The two zones are tied together by the same wraparound view of Burrard Inlet. The camera can move between formal news and a quieter conversation without leaving Vancouver.
A fireside lounge for interviews and analysis — stone hearth, sculpted cedar walls and a wraparound window framing the mountains. The cosy counterpoint to the main desk. Design by Patrick Larsen.
What it picked up
The set won a BDA Gold for Production Design and was nominated for a Gemini Award by the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television.
After dark: the same set, re-lit. The chandelier of rings becomes the hero, with the harbour and Canada Place sails glowing through the glass behind the desk. Design by Patrick Larsen.
Why I still talk about it
Vancouver sits at the heart of my broadcast work, with Education Nation and the later BBC Sport jobs at Rio and Wimbledon. Long before the resorts and the ceremonies, I was already designing for very large live audiences. Just on the other side of the camera.
The wider studio floor — sculpted cedar columns, a freestanding screen wall and the harbour window — choreographed so cameras could move between desk, lounge and graphics walls without ever leaving the world of the set. Design by Patrick Larsen.
