In the last two years, Florencia Martin has quickly established herself as the go-to production designer for auteurs who want to transform modern day Los Angeles into a vivid evocation of the city as it exists in our memories, dreams, and fantasies.
Her meticulous recreations of the 197os San Fernando Valley in Paul Thomas Anderson’s “Licorice Pizza” and 1950s Hollywood in Andrew Dominik’s “Blonde” represent some of the most impressive design work in recent memory, but Martin was just getting warmed up: With “Babylon,” Damien Chazelle’s celebration and indictment of Hollywood in the late 1920s, the production designer has created her most sprawling, detailed, and audacious sets to date.Working with set decorator Anthony Carlino, Martin fills scene after scene with colorful surroundings that both express and comment on the characters’ inner desires and tensions, all while remaining faithful to the period without losing a modern sense of immediacy.
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