When Pinewood Studios opened its production facility just outside Atlanta in 2014 it wasn’t originally envisaged as a fully integrated community where film industry people could work, live and socialise. Pinewood’s partners did see the opportunity to build a town whose residents would collaborate on film projects from start to finish, and that’s how we got Trilith, a 235-acre new urbanist community built within the 900-acre studio site.
“Originally the idea of it was to do a mill town, a company town, which just meant get some housing here because people have got to live somewhere, and we want to make it convenient. And it grew into, if you’re going to build a town from scratch, what would you do?
We’re not talking about some kind of fantasy nirvana. We’re talking about a real town, with the grit of a real town, the authenticity of a real town, all different housing types, all the way down to making sure all of your teams can afford to live here.
I know a lot of industries work this way, but it’s particular to the film industry that we like to make stuff together, we like to hang out together, we like to drink together, we like to raise our families together. It just wouldn’t exist without the town.”
Rob Parker, President, Trilith
Trilith is densely-populated and pedestrian-friendly with a commercial centre and lots of green space, and will eventually be home to 5,000 residents. The re-named Trilith Studios now includes office space for a diverse range of companies, and this is starting to be reflected in the community make-up.
“Instead of just being a soundstage facility that you haul people to when you’re ready to shoot, it can be a place where the development team can live and work, or have a second home at. In some cases we have producers and production managers and coordinators that are now just living here because there’s so many shows coming.”
Frank Patterson, President and CEO, Trilith Studios
Could this new generation of vertically integrated film industry community catch on elsewhere?
Source: Fast Company