A three dimensional digital billboard of the future
A futuristic new monument to commerce might be on its way to the Sunset Strip.
As Wehoville reports, the West Hollywood City Council will decide Monday whether to approve a giant, three-dimensional billboard called “The Belltower.” Reportedly billed by one of its creators as “the most ‘Instagrammable’ billboard in the world,” the 72-foot tall tower would project an array of kaleidoscopic images—not all of them ads.
West Hollywood has lately been trying to revitalize a Sunset Strip tradition of playing host to some of the most gloriously ostentatious advertising this side of the Mississippi. As such, the city put out a call for designs for an innovative new kind of billboard that could be placed at a city-owned parking lot on Sunset.
The city narrowed nine proposals down to four finalists, including a proposal by the late Zaha Hadid. Now, judges have recommended The Belltower, a collaboration between Orange Barrel Media, Tom Wiscombe Architecture, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and engineering firm Walter P. Moore.
According to a project proposal, only 25 percent of the billboard’s imagery would be devoted to advertising. Other areas of the monolithic structure would be set aside for visual art and what the proposal calls “dark media.”
The project proposal explains that The Belltower “speaks to a world where commercial cultural content can be hybridized, and media is no longer a just a way of advertising but a way of life.”
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Orange Barrel Media is reportedly guaranteeing the city of West Hollywood will see $ 4.5 million in advertising revenue over the next five years if the billboard is approved.