Hostile Booth Architecture
As Carnival season closes in on us, it is important to impress upon the larger Carnegie Mellon community the necessity of intelligent booth design. Of course, building codes and safety regulations are all well and good, but student organizations must be aware of a more fundamental factor affecting the quality of their booths. The only way to ensure a booth remains pristine and functional is preventing unwanted interference by hostile forces. And, by potentially hostile forces… well, let’s just say: the students.
Our honest booth builders and their structures are always threatened by the conniving influences of Carnegie Mellon students, faculty, and alumni. But there is hope for them, hope found in techniques of cities around the world, crusading to keep people out of the places they think for some reason they’re supposed to be allowed to go, because you should be able to exist in public areas or something.
So here’s an expert list we’ve put together, to help YOU keep your booth safe and sound.
Spikes. You’ve probably seen expanses of sidewalk with little tiny spikes jutting out to prevent people from lying down on them, but these are just a compromise, as people are still able to walk and ultimately just exist among them. We suggest increasing the size of your spikes (around 20 inches or so will do for a start) and installing them in a random pattern on the floor of your booth. This way, any student attempting to enter and wreak havoc will find themselves unable to probe the depths of your structure. If you’re lucky, you can even trap them in there, Loggerhead Shrike style, to appropriately reprimand later.
Slopes and curves. Going beyond the basic curved benches and barriers designed to be uncomfortable for unwanted visitors, one can bring the same inaccessibility to the entrance to one’s booth. This may look like a large slide or steep incline that visitors must scale in order to access the door. After they expend significant energy climbing, slipping, falling down, and trying again, they reach the top just to find - oh no! - that’s the decoy door. (I like to call this a cheeky wee surprise, for the uninitiated and stupid students trying to enjoy their Carnival).
The Moat. This is a personal favorite. Employing the moat method is perhaps the simplest of all the anti-visitor options we have provided, as it requires nothing more than a shovel, some water, and maybe a few alligators or something. You’ll need a bit of time, but you have all of build week to get the requisite permits for uprooting Midway. Bonus points if you don’t have a drawbridge. Students fall into the moat, alligators get food, and nobody enters your precious booth - a win-win-win.
ReadMe guarantees that any student organization that abides by the above guidelines will keep their booth untainted by the hands of misguided visitors. And you’ll probably win the competition, too.