Window display · Little Big Town · Rome · Piazza Venezia

Little Big Town.

For the largest toy megastore ever opened in Italy — the Roman FAO Schwarz just steps away from Piazza Venezia — we built scenographic pieces for the store's themed areas.

Story

One act

The experience-store
in the heart of Rome.

Little Big Town opened in Rome in the mid-2000s as the largest toy store in Italy: a multi-floor megastore just a few steps from Piazza Venezia, modelled on the famous FAO Schwarz of New York and Hamleys of London. It wasn't a shop: it was an experience-store for families and tourists.

Inside it housed spectacular themed areas: rooms dedicated to magic tricks, LEGO worlds, giant plush toys, in-the-flesh game demonstrators. It was a regular stop for school groups on field trips to Rome and for families on weekend afternoons.

For Little Big Town we built in our workshops scenographic pieces destined for the store's themed areas — the same oversized emblem-objects used to visually mark a retail space and to act as internal landmarks for the visitor. The photos from our archive document the workshop production phase.

The megastore closed for good in September 2020, after more than ten years of activity. The closure came at the end of a difficult period for large-scale toy distribution in Italy — hit first by Amazon, then by the pandemic lockdowns. It remains an important chapter of Rome's retail experience.

The store in Piazza Venezia. The sign of the Roman megastore, active for over ten years

View of the workshop site during the fabrication of a scenographic piece for Little Big Town: polystyrene carving, painting equipment, warehouse floor — **In the workshop.** The fabrication phase of the piece before transport to the store

Behind the scenes

FAO Schwarz,
but in Italian.

The American retail experience is a precise genre: themed areas inside the same space, oversized emblem-objects in every zone, a visitor route designed like that of a theme park. Little Big Town tried to bring that model to Rome.

The FAO Schwarz model

FAO Schwarz (New York, since 1862) and Hamleys (London, since 1760) are the two great international models of the toy store as immersive experience: they don't just sell objects, they sell the journey through the store. Areas dedicated to plush, to magic, to LEGO worlds, to board games — each with its own set design.

The workshop pieces

For the Roman store we built pieces carved in polystyrene + fibreglass, hand-finished in a saturated colour palette — the same technique as our TV commissions for Braccio e la Mente or for the ACME props of the Looney Tunes. The difference is permanent installation in a retail environment: years of exposure, artificial lighting, proximity to the public.

The Roman context

Central Rome is a tough context for large-scale retail: protected spaces under superintendency oversight, complex logistics, high rents. The megastore near Piazza Venezia had to deal with these constraints — and turned them into opportunities: school groups on field trips, tourists who entered "because we're in Rome", the local weekend crowd. A rare platform for anyone wanting to sell toys to the tourist trade.

10+ years

the total duration of the Roman toy megastore's activity

Sept 2020

the date of the Roman store's definitive closure

P. Venezia

the megastore's location — a few steps from Rome's monumental square

Workshop pieces

Photos from our archive
in production.

The photos from our Drive archive document the carving and finishing phase of the pieces destined for the Roman store.

Raw polystyrene scenographic piece being worked on in our workshops, destined for the Little Big Town megastore in Rome: detail of the carving before the polychrome finish — Raw polystyrene being worked on

Another scenographic piece in production at our workshops for the Little Big Town megastore in Rome: view of the workshop with sculpting equipment — View of the workshop — Creation Art ateliers

Second life

The retail experience
of a capital city.

The megastore has closed, but the retail experience thread is still open. The same scenographic window-display techniques can be found in our subsequent commissions: the Spider-Man suspended from the ceiling at Rocco Giocattoli on Corso Francia, the sculpted pieces for the European Disney premiere of Maleficent, the installations for the private events and celebrations.

The Italian experience-store is still a niche craft, but a living one: those who know how to sculpt a themed area inside a retail space solve at the same time the problem of visual identity and that of customer word-of-mouth. Little Big Town was our Italian school of the model.

Tech sheet

All production data

Type: Scenographic pieces for retail · permanent scenographic window display for toy megastore
Client: Little Big Town · Italy's largest toy megastore
Location: Central Rome · a few steps from Piazza Venezia
Reference model: FAO Schwarz (New York) and Hamleys (London) — experience-stores with dedicated themed areas
Themed areas of the store: Magic-trick rooms · LEGO worlds · giant plush toys · in-the-flesh game demonstrators
Techniques: High-density expanded polystyrene carved by hand · stiffening laminated fibreglass · polychrome glaze finish · transport to the store and installation in a retail space
Duration of the store's activity: Over ten years — definitive closure September 2020
Our role: Fabrication of scenographic pieces for the store's themed areas · carving, polychrome finishing, delivery to the store
Second life: Store closed in 2020 · scenographic window-display techniques entered the workshop's repertoire, applied to subsequent retail commissions