Grand Hotel — Annie Varberg

The project

Tasked with refreshing the historic Grand Hotel’s content library, WeCreate Media brought me on board to produce a hybrid video/photo shoot for this storied hotel.

Since the late 1800’s, the Grand Hotel has been a premiere getaway destination in the U.S., including for some past U.S. Presidents! Located on Mackinac Island in Lake Huron, this remote hotel can only be accessed by boat, followed by walking on foot, bicycle, or a horse-drawn carriage ride. No motorized vehicles are allowed. The nearest major city to Mackinaw, the town where the ferry boats are docked, is a several hour drive away.

Given the remote location, and to keep costs down, I knew it’d be important to source a cast and crew from nearby Michigan cities. My search led me to Cold Box Films in Lansing, MI and Unique Models & Talent in Grand Rapids, MI. Both vendors were invaluable partners in executing this shoot with a short pre-production window of 2.5 weeks.

The hotel property spans much of the island, and it was our job to capture it all in just 3 days of filming. A scout trip and some expert scheduling by our Production Coordinator helped us order our shoot days in a way that maximized our time with the various talent pairings and locations on the island. In the end, we only needed one company move using the horse-drawn carriages. Every other location change was accomplished on foot. Which made it possible for us to capture photo and video assets of 12 scenes in just 3 days.