TV SETS: Mad Men, Seasons 1-3

With the news that Mad Men was just picked up for two, possibly three more seasons, I thought it would be an excellent time to take a look back at the fantastic work that production designer Dan Bishop and the show’s art department team have produced. This week’s post will focus on seasons 1-3 and the next TV Sets post will focus on season 4, which was just released on BluRay on March 29th. Since Season 5 won’t be airing until early 2012, buying the dvds would be a good way to stave off Mad Men withdrawal this year.

PRODUCTION DESIGN

Dan Bishop has won 4 Art Director’s Guild awards for his work on Mad Men, and it’s easy to see why – every single set is absolutely, breathtakingly gorgeous. Here’s an interview Dan did with the Washington Post and two Q&A interviews from the AMCtv website.

SET DECORATION

Amy Wells is the set decorator for Mad Men, and I’m sure many of us wish we had her job – finding the perfect mid-century furniture to complete Dan Bishop’s sets. Learn more about Amy’s work process by listening to this fantastic interview she gave to NPR , or reading this interview with Interior Design.net. AMCtv.com also did two Q&A interviews with her.

COSTUME

Janie Bryant is the show’s phenomenal costume designer. What would Mad Men be without Joan’s va-va-voom dresses or Don’s dapper suits? There are two great articles at All Plaidout and The Steel Closet in which Janie discusses the details of most of the characters’ season two looks.

PROPS

Mad Men creator Matt Weiner and the crew pay obsessive attention to detail when it comes to the authenticity of props from the early ’60s era. Entertainment Weekly has a feature detailing some essential Mad Men props and set dressing. Propmaster Scott Buckwald gave a great interview to Collector’s Weekly and there’s another fantastic interview about props with Season 3 propmaster Ellen Freund at Independent.co.uk.

AMC VIDEOS

The AMCtv.com Mad Men website has a ton of great videos with cast and crew members.

Dan Bishop and set decorator Amy Wells describe their jobs and talk about how they collaborate together.

Amy Wells gives us a tour of the Drapers’ redesigned living room from Season 3.

A sneak peek into what Janie Bryant’s costume shop for the show consists of.

Property Master Gay Perello shows off some of the props used in the Season 3 premiere. There are some other great props videos for the Season 3 episodes “My Old Kentucky Home”, “The Arrangements”, and “The Fog”.

MISC. INTERVIEWS

Boston.com interview with Christopher Brown, Art Director

Design*Sponge interview with Adam Rowe, Art Assistant

This is the first time in four years that Mad Men isn’t airing during the summer months. How do you plan to get your ’60s design fix this summer? What is your favourite season of Mad Men? Favourite set? Favourite character?

Alison Hickey