‘A Murder at the End of the World’ Production Designer Alex DiGerlando Discusses How They Created That Futuristic Hotel

Awards Daily talks to FX on Hulu’s A Murder at the End of the World production designer Alex DiGerlando about how the hotels play an important role on the series and how Iceland mirrors Utah.

Hotels are important set pieces in A Murder at the End of the World. First, there’s the dingy one that Darby (Emma Corrin) and Bill (Harris Dickinson) stay in in the past in Utah and then there’s the one in the present that Andy Ronson (Clive Owen) invites a slew of VIPs to that kicks off the FX on Hulu limited series.

“It was important that [the Iceland hotel] was circular in terms of the cycle of time, the way you kind of hop on and off the train of chronologies in the story,” said A Murder at the End of the World production designer, Alex DiGerlando. “Once we decided on a smaller, more contained hotel, we started looking back at Agatha Christie stories that inspired this and realized those took place in a manor house in the English countryside. What would the equivalent of that be in our story? That helped us wrap our heads around it being a boutique hotel.”

At first, the AMAEOW team couldn’t find a hotel on location to fit the look they were going for, so DiGerlando and his team had to build the set. They ended up building a semi-circle that they would redress to make it a full circle. They also had to consider the reveal in the show that the hotel is actually a fortress.

“So we were thinking about what makes a fortress? We looked at Hakka, or Chinese walled cities to protect residents from the outside. The more we talked, we realized these people wouldn’t be living in spaces that are what we think of as futuristic. They may be designing that, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the way they live. So with the idea that money is no object, we thought of something made of imported wood. There aren’t huge forests, so big lumber would have to be imported to Iceland. All the walls are Venetian plaster. Andy would have brought in artists from Italy to do that. Japanese cedar, which is a theme throughout. We really killed ourselves to make everything very thoughtful and very designed. We thought it was important for the guests to feel like they were in something very special and unique that only someone with that access and resources could provide.”

Parts of Ronson’s hotel were based on the real-life Icelandic Deplar Farm, a hotel converted from a farmhouse, that’s actually owned by a billionaire.

“It’s built on two planes, where when you approach it, you enter on the top floor, and then you go down to where there are rooms and the spa and the pool. So in the show, when you see that indoor pool Darby runs through to get to Bill’s window and also where she gets stuck inside the pool cover, the plan was just to shoot that.”

The VFX team digitally added Bill’s room on the other side of the glass because they couldn’t get all of the pieces they needed due to a COVID outbreak on set.

“The pane of glass that essentially separates Bill and Darby. Of course, what’s on the other side of the glass, we built on our stage in New Jersey. So we joke that we went all the way to Iceland for a pane of glass.”

They also used the real-life Bach Baths geothermal bathhouse as a grounded setting for the show, this one also built into the landscape.

“So you enter the bathhouse and go through it, past the check-in, locker rooms, and cafe, and when you get to the back part, you’re at these floating pools [the ones you see the first night Darby’s there]. What’s cool about the building is that it rests nestled to the ground. You go underground essentially and go back up above ground to get to the pools, and then there’s grass up on the roof. The year before we started filming, we were looking for what could be an entry point, and I said, well, why don’t we use this as our entrance and the actual hotel would sit above it? And that’s what we ended up doing. When you see her go down the ramp that leads to the wooden door — that’s Bach Baths. Then our underground lobby leading to the big staircase, we’re all on the sound stage.”

DiGerlando said people are always disappointed when they discover that Andy Ronson’s place doesn’t really exist. However, the hotel in the past timeline DOES actually exist.

“The hotel I think is called Whispering Sands, and it provided exactly what Brit visualized for that opening moment, that sweeping approach to this lonely hotel in the middle of this barren landscape. They were so adamant that they wanted to shoot those pieces out in actual Utah and for good reason. Also, it was cool that there’s a real rhyme between Iceland and Utah; their landscapes are alien. One we showcased covered in snow and other in desert. It added this otherworldly feel to this vibe of the show.”

A Murder at the End of the World is streaming on Hulu.