Client:

The Australian National University (ANU) runs an annual Open Day where prospective students and families come through campus to explore facilities and speak directly with faculties, student services, and staff.

Challenge:

This wasn’t a typical exhibition setup. It was a large, working campus that needed to handle a high volume of visitors moving between buildings, departments, and outdoor areas.

ANU needed a simple, repeatable setup that could work across different spaces while giving each faculty and team a clear place to operate from. Navigation was also important. People needed to be able to find where they were going without confusion.

Solution:

The Party Hire Company delivered a campus-wide setup using Octanorm shell scheme as the base system.

We installed 85 Octanorm booths across the site. These weren’t traditional exhibitor booths. They were used by faculties, student services, and internal ANU teams as information points where staff could speak directly with attendees.

• 85 x Octanorm booths (2m x 1m configuration)
• Custom high bar setups for key interaction areas
• Counters and brochure stands for information sharing
• Power distribution across multiple areas of campus

Around that, we delivered the supporting infrastructure needed to make the day run smoothly:

• Campus-wide signage including floor decals, stair graphics, and directional signage
• 30+ LCD screens and a large LED screen for messaging and schedules
• Outdoor marquees to extend usable space
• Furniture packages including tables, stools, and seating zones

The Octanorm system made it easy to roll out a consistent setup across very different parts of the campus without overcomplicating things.

Outcome:

ANU Open Day 2023 ran as a clear, easy-to-navigate campus experience rather than a fragmented event.

• 85 functional information booths delivered across campus
• Consistent setup for faculties and internal teams
• Simplified navigation through clear signage
• Strong engagement through face-to-face conversations with staff

The setup gave ANU a structured way to manage a large open campus while still keeping the experience approachable for visitors.

Conclusion:

This project wasn’t about building an exhibition. It was about making a large university campus work as a single, coordinated Open Day experience.

Using a modular system like Octanorm allowed everything to stay consistent, flexible, and easy to roll out at scale, without overengineering the setup.