Anyone walking past Selfridges on London’s Oxford Street recently may be have wondered how that giant model of Yayoi Kusama, a famous Japanese artist, appeared above the department store’s main entrance overnight. We’ll let you into a secret – this giant statue got a little lift from one of our Unic mini spider cranes.
The sculpture of Kusama, who has collaborated with fashion designer Louis Vuitton on a new collection, was installed as part of Selfridges’ launch of their new concept store and windows scheme. Made of fibreglass, the 500kg statue stands at 6 metres tall and was covered in bubble wrap during the lift so its red polka dot paintwork remained undamaged.
On this overnight job, a 2.9 tonne capacity Unic URW-376 mini spider crane was set up on the road and pavement to lift the sculpture 10.5 metres high into position on the canopy. Take a look at our mini crane in action on Louis Vuitton’s exclusive Making Of video.
We like to think that Yayoi Kusama would approve of our Unic mini crane being used for this high fashion lift, since it is “Made in Japan” and matches her red dress!
