Mastercard Cube at Dubai Expo
Client:
Mastercard
Agency:
Lightblue
Production:
UNIT9
Role:
Creative Director
Year:
2022
As the Official Payment Technology Partner of Expo 2020 Dubai, Mastercard needed a pavilion that could stop people in their tracks and make the future of payment technology feel genuinely exciting.
The answer was the Mastercard Cube
a striking structure with three sides wrapped in enormous LED screens displaying dynamic CGI particle animations, each themed around Mastercard's four Passion Points: sport, food, music, and sustainability.
The exterior was the hook. The interior was the experience.
Inside, a 360° LED room created a seamless cinematic environment synchronised with up to four Microsoft HoloLens 2 devices, letting visitors step into personalised mixed reality journeys: an electrifying football moment with Messi, a live concert with Camila Cabello, a intimate dinner with 4 renowned chefs, or a vision of a more sustainable world.
Results
Top 20
Innovations
Expo 2020 Dubai
182
Days
Non-stop
Most Immersive
Partner Pavillion
The National
How was it made?
Designing for two scales at once
The core creative challenge was designing an experience that worked at two completely different scales simultaneously: a building-sized spectacle visible from across the Expo site, and an intimate mixed reality journey for individual visitors inside.
Six months of content that never got old
The exterior demanded content that could hold attention across six months of continuous operation.
A suite of CGI particle animations was created for the LED walls, each tied to a different brand theme, giving repeat visitors something new to discover while maintaining a coherent visual identity for the Cube as a whole.
Syncing a room full of realities
The interior presented a different problem: synchronising a 360° LED environment with multiple HoloLens 2 devices running simultaneously, each guiding a different visitor through a different journey, while keeping the shared room experience coherent for everyone inside at the same time.
The mixed reality layer was designed to extend the physical environment rather than replace it.
Running for 182 days without stopping
The last challenge wasn't creative, it was operational. Keeping a complex mixed reality experience running reliably for 182 consecutive days at one of the world's largest events required to be prepared in advance.
Brand ambassadors were on the floor at all times, guiding hundreds of visitors through the HoloLens journeys and managing the technical setup throughout. Every ambassador was trained to handle the equipment, maintain the experience quality, and keep things moving from the first visitor of the day to the last.
Aside from scheduled maintenance windows, nothing broke. The Cube ran — day after day, for six months.
Gallery
Zlaten del Castillo
Creative Director
London, UK
Brussels, Belgium
Available globally
All work shown with permission. All rights belong to the respective clients and production companies.