Hey Arnold! @ Comic-con
CLIENT: nickelodeon | 📍 san diego, california
Context: To promote Hey Arnold! The Jungle Movie at San Diego ComicCon, we recreated Helga’s basement in the back of a truck for fans to explore and view featured exclusive content of the movie. The build-out was used as a set for filmed promotional segments with Hey Arnold illustrator Craig Bartlett, SyFy, and the Nickelodeon team.
Prior to Comic-Con, guerilla-style flyers were wild-posted throughout five cities to prompt fans to text a number for hints about the movie premiere.
Design Direction: For this experience, I split up the truck into two sections representing Helga's closet and her basement because in the TV show, she memorably accesses the basement via a secret rope near a homemade shrine of Arnold. Both areas contained surprise-and-delight items that demonstrated Helga's undying love for Arnold and the obsessive documentation she compiled of his life.
I hand-doodled the flyers to make them appear as if they were drawn by the characters themselves rather than issued as official marketing material by Nickelodeon.
Experiential Designer, Awestruck Marketing
concept development, graphic design, hand sketches, renderings, brand ambassador apparel, onsite installation and propping
Creator of Hey Arnold’s Craig Bartlett tours the truck experience
“For fans of [Hey] Arnold trivia, this is kind of the holy grail!”
Promotional Flyers
Truck Activation
The closet includes a rack of Helga's dresses and hair bows, a shrine of Arnold, a custom Arnold rug, and a Shrine Supply Box filled with Arnold=related items (footballs, chewed up pieces of gum, an old sandwich, etc.)
After walking through "the closet" guests can explore Helga's basement. Multiple screens playing video footage of Arnold are flanked by shelves of home videos Helga has chronicled of Arnold's life.
Arnold Shrine flanked with candles and string lights
A framed photo of Arnold rests above Helga’s computer desk
As Helga only has one outfit, we created multiple copies of the same jumper and hair bow for her closet.
Small surprise and Delight Items
Arnold Sketch
Lock of Arnold's hair
HELGA acrostic
Arnold poem
Arnold-shaped ink blot
Helga's Saturday to-do list
Video tape graphic wall
3 video cases can be opened to reveal surprise items inside, including a floor plan of Arnold's bedroom, a time log, and photos of Arnold with his pet pig
We included popular fortune-telling games from the 90’s such as MASH and cootie catchers, all pointing to a favorable outcome for Helga, of course!
Blueprint of Arnold’s bedroom
A log of Helga’s video recordings documenting Arnold’s mundane life are inspired by or reference various episodes from the TV show.
Street Team
Helga waiting at the San Diego airport for Arnold (AKA Football Head)
Poster and t-shirt design for street team
Posters and costume design for Helga street team
Renderings
Graphics
Custom-illustrated graphics based on inspiration images from the Hey Arnold series
Binder labels: “Of Arnold and Men” / “Much Ado About Arnold” / “The Importance of Being Arnold” / “The Call of the Arnold” / “Gone with the Arnold”
Photo Album Copy: “ARNOLD’S BABY DAYS” / “Warning: Contents are VERY CUTE”
Left Bottle Copy: “LOVE POTION” / “FOR RESEARCH USE ONLY” / “PROJ#2957 50%KI”
Right Bottle Copy: “Arnold’s Trash” / “Days 50-255
Video Tape Cases
Arnold Rug
Computer towers
KEY METRICS
9.150 direct engagements, 183,000+ impressions in market, 1,541 Instagram posts