Sometimes this job is just searching a haystack for a needle. Back in the covid days, a small puppet production came out of a group I'd been watching for years. They'd always been cagey about who they worked with — that's just how some corners of this industry operate. But on this one, for once, they gave out proper credits.
One of them read "prop maker: Donovan Banville." I went and looked him up expecting a website full of foam and hot glue. He wasn't a prop maker, not really. He built large costumes for shows, background props for TV and film, and had a history in puppetry going back years, developing the things as well as building them. I read through his credits and realised I needed to meet this man. I'd struck gold.
I sent an email asking if he'd be up for meeting. An invite came back to his studio, tucked away on the opposite side of London.
I headed over and stepped into a long corridor, trying to work out which unit was his. Every lock-up along it was doing something different — a bike workshop, an antiques dealer, a sweet wholesaler.
His studio was right at the end. Nothing on the plain metal door gave anything away. I knocked. Footsteps on the other side, then a few locks and bolts sliding back before Donovan opened up.
He greeted me with a warm handshake and let me in. The place was huge — high ceilings, and every surface covered in something. Fabrics, paints, half-finished puppets, designs pinned across the walls, tools and boxes stacked wherever there was room.
He shared the studio with two others. One built large touring figures — dinosaurs, mostly — starting as small maquettes before being scaled right up. The other made costumes, miniature and full-size, human and animal. The three of them worked together when it suited and apart when it didn't. They had a good thing going.
I explained what I was after. He said he was interested, and that he'd get a price over to me.