Pipe and drape

Pipe and drape is a kit: heavy steel bases, telescopic aluminium uprights, horizontal crossbars dropped between them, and fabric panels hung from the crossbars on sewn pockets. It divides a room, backs a stage, hides a storage area or lines a row of exhibition booths, and it goes up and comes down fast.

Two ordering mistakes account for most disappointing results, and both are arithmetic.

The first is fullness. Fabric ordered to match the length of the wall arrives flat, stretched and shiny, and reads as cheap under any light. Drape is gathered, and the convention is one and a half to twice the fabric width for every foot of coverage. A hundred feet of wall needs a hundred and fifty to two hundred feet of drape, and the difference between those two numbers is the difference between a pleated wall and a bedsheet.

The second is height. Panels are cut shorter than the uprights, because the crossbar sits at the top and the pocket consumes the difference. Ordering panels to the nominal upright height produces drape that puddles on the floor or hardware that shows above it.

The fabric itself is usually banjo — a medium-sheen polyester that is inherently flame resistant and holds a pleat. Velour is the heavier, deeper alternative where the room is being dressed rather than divided, and it absorbs light and sound in a way banjo does not.

Corporate event production — owned inventory, our own crew, and a site survey before anything is specified.

• Soft goods The collective name for every piece of fabric in a production — drapes, legs, borders, skirts, cycs and backdrops — and a category that lives or dies on its paperwork.
• Backdrop The surface behind the stage — fabric, printed, hard scenic or an LED wall — and the decision that sets what the lighting and the cameras can do.
• Masking The drape that defines what the audience cannot see — legs at the sides, a border across the top, and the difference between a finished stage and a visible crew.