Annie Atkins – At the Design Museum’s Wes Anderson exhibition
On 21 November the new Wes Anderson: The Archives exhibition opened at the Design Museum. This takes a fairly comprehensive look at Anderson’s films, from his experiments in the early 90s through to works-in-progress. As its title suggests, this was enabled by the Design Museum being given access to Anderson’s personal archives.
As you most likely know, Annie Atkins has collaborated with Anderson on some of his more recent films, starting with The Grand Budapest Hotel, and taking in Isle of Dogs and The French Dispatch. She created highly detailed and researched props for the films, ranging from posters, signs, letters, and objects that help create the alternative reality of a Wes Anderson film. Her work now takes its place among the hundreds of objects making up the exhibition, that also include original storyboards, scripts, puppets and costumes.
The exhibition is open until 26 July 2026, and is expected to be very popular, so you’re advised to book in advance. You can do so here.
We thought it was a good time to have a chat with Annie about her collaborations with Wes Anderson:
How did you first make the connection with Wes?
I’d been working on a TV series about the building of the Titanic in Belfast, and he was looking for a European graphic designer with ‘plenty of early 20th Century ephemera’ in their portfolio. Well, I had plenty of that… old menus, tickets, letterpress posters, antique newspaper replicas. I had worked with the production designer of Mr Fox, Nelson Lowry, on a Laika animation, so he put him in touch with me.
Had you worked on films before?
I’d done a ton of costume drama here in Ireland. The Tudors, Camelot, the Titanic thing, plus I’d done The Boxtrolls, which is an animated feature.
Was there a huge leap in moving from TV productions to feature films?
It’s pretty similar really. The worst part about TV is that you’re working with 10 or 12 different scripts and multiple directors. It can get complicated. One feature script and one director feels much easier after that.
Was there an interview or pitch process before you got the job working on The Grand Budapest Hotel?
Yes, I had to make three sample props. A newspaper (The Trans Alpine Yodel), a restaurant menu, and another thing that I can’t remember. I decided to just play it straight and make them super-realistic historical artefacts.
What’s the working process with Wes? Are there very detailed briefs, close collaboration, or are you allowed to interpret a broad brief and suggest items?
I always start by sending him real historical references of paper ephemera and letting him pick out the ones he likes. Then it’s just a case of trial and error, making maybe upwards of twenty different versions until it lands.
Can you tell us more about the Mendl’s piece?
The pink Mendl’s boxes popped up pretty much everywhere in the 1930s sequences of The Grand Budapest Hotel. We had hundreds of them screen printed, and all the artwork was done by hand: the word ‘MENDL’S’ by our illustrator, and the rest of the lettering and filigree by me. Because nothing went through a digital spellcheck, I mistakenly added an extra ‘T’ into the word ‘pâtisserie’, and no-one spotted it until we were already halfway through the shoot. I was embarrassed – it was such a prominent prop, and we’d already filmed with stacks and stacks of them. Luckily the producers were very calm about it and just said they’d fix the mistake in post on any boxes that were actually readable on screen. Then, months after the film came out, I started seeing imitation Mendl’s boxes popping up on eBay. Some were surprisingly close, although the exact shades of pink and red, and that particular ribbon texture, are quite hard to copy. The giveaway was always the spelling. If the box had the extra ‘T’, you knew it had been on set.
Do you have a particular graphic that you’ve produced for any of the Wes films that stands out for you? And, if so, do tell us more about it.
The pink Grand Budapest book that opens the movie. It’s quite rare to make a prop that has the name of the movie on it. They made little brooches out of it for the Design Museum shop, so you can go home with one if you visit. :)
Was it a completely different experience working on a non-live action film like Isle of Dogs?
I did most of Isle of Dogs remotely, as I was heavily pregnant at the time with my first baby. But I love animation graphic props. You get to sit and draw everything by hand, in miniature. It’s a fun way to work.
Were you involved with the Design Museum exhibition at all?
There were a couple of emails with questions about certain props, but the curators did an incredible job of unearthing all that material.
Are you planning to visit?
Yes, I’ll bring the family next year. :)
