Season one of Netflix’s Wednesday was a monster hit, to say the least. Centered around the Addams family and teen outcasts with extraordinary powers, the record-breaking series dethroned Stranger Things season four from its number-one spot to become the streamer’s most-viewed show in its debut week. While Jenna Ortega’s delightfully deadpan portrayal of the stoic titular character drew legions of viewers, it’s Tim Burton’s masterfully meticulous design that truly allows its supernatural characters to flourish. From the Addams family car to the offices, dorm rooms, and lean towers of Nevermore Academy, each set is cloaked in just the right amount of the director’s signature Gothic moodiness to bring the show’s mythical characters (werewolves, sirens, and the like) to life.
Production designer Mark Scruton delivers yet another dose of Burton’s distinctive dark and otherworldly aesthetic for season two, this time nestled in the emerald countryside of Ireland (which stands in for the Jericho, Vermont, setting of the fictional Nevermore Academy). In AD’s behind-the-scenes tour, the veteran set designer shares that authenticity has always been his guiding force. “We don’t rely on blue screens or anything like that. It’s all in-camera.” Sets were constructed from the ground up and, clearly, when it comes to Burton’s vision, more is always more.
The Link
Nevermore’s slate gray, brick-clad quad looks plucked straight from the 18th century. The school’s façade, adorned with gargoyles representative of its supernatural student body, allows peeks of the Irish landscape beyond the set “to give us some connection back to the real world,” per Scruton. The Link also includes features like the Tell Tale Coffee Shop, a food truck that offers, among other outcast-specific items, blood bags for vampire students. Nevermore’s main hallway was filmed inside one of Ireland’s most renowned castles, Charleville, which boasts an oversized Gothic picture window. Scruton recreated this feature on-set so that, visually, the audience “can seamlessly move from this set to that location and feel like it’s one, big cohesive space.”