Bringing Our Boardroom to Burning Man

This is our group setting up in 2011. It’s crucial that you have a structure that protects you and your tent from the elements—the sun, interminable heat, and dust storms.

The scope of this festival can be hard to appreciate until you’ve actually been there. It’s huge, literally the size of a small city. For the week the festival is on, it’s officially the 6th largest city in Nevada.

This is our art car project that my friend Sean built that our group does called the Board Room. It’s a board room table built on a car chassis with built in office chairs and a white board. We haul the thing down from Vancouver in pieces in the back of a 5 ton truck. This is the year we kicked it up a notch and installed neon trim and fluorescent lighting posts so we can have board meetings throughout the night.

Here’s a shot of a friend from Toronto who I met for the first time on this burn. He’s wearing a suite because he’s taking part in our art car known as the Board Room. More on this later.

Here’s the outlook from the ORC, our camp. It’s a really great spot because of the openness to the playa. Great sunsets too.

The board room at dusk. Dr. James is ready to go, but it’s been a long day for the girls.

It’s important that you always have your dust mask and goggles on you at all times while you’re out on the playa. You never know when a dust storm will hit.

Here’s the Trojan Horse, a joint project from some folks in SF and right here in Vancouver. It’s got a door on the back that drops to the ground, and there’s a bar and DJ booth inside. They had an elaborate ceremony where a large group of people in costume pulled the horse with rope a few hundred yards, then burned it to the ground with flaming arrows.

This is a pretty good size yacht that someone put on the chassis of a school bus. It usually hangs out by a really long dock that someone builds very year by the Thunder Dome. Yes, THAT Thunder Dome.

Flames and pyrotechnics are ubiquitous at Burning Man. So is the post-apocalyptic, Road Warrior thing.

This is the Temple—it’s an elaborate structure that’s radically different every year and burned to the ground at the end of the week. It’s a massive structure that’s usually completed mere hours before they open the gate. It’s a very spiritual place where people leave momentos or write messages to the recently deceased. It’s pretty powerful to walk into, completely silent and full of hundreds of people reflecting on those they’ve lost.

These guys hang the torches along the centre roads that lead to The Man before nightfall.

This is my friend Neil resting in his giraffe suite before heading out to the Distrikt. This photo defies explanation.

Here he is again in full glory.

This is a shot from Distrikt, which is a art camp just down the road from our camp.

Spontaneous dance party in the middle of a dust storm. Music is everywhere.

Here’s a group shot before heading out for a night time board meeting. A doctor, lawyer, writer, interior designer, engineer, environmental consultant, supply chain management professional, a couple of IT guys, advertising and creative directors, etc. – we’re serious people outside of Burning Man. But we’re all business during Burning Man.