Veteran set decorator Lauri Gaffin has spent a career dressing up films from indie classics to blockbusters. Her new photographic memoir takes us behind the scenes of this ever-changing job – and on the hunt for wolves’ penis bones

‘Dynamic design possibilities’ … the motel from Land of the Lost.

Wed 10 Dec 2025 02.00 EST

Wrecked diner, Ford Ranch, New Mexico (from the film Thor)

Moving Still is a personal and artistic journey through the world of film-making, captured by veteran set decorator and photographer Lauri Gaffin. Fusing stunning behind-the-scenes imagery with intimate reflections, Gaffin offers a rare glimpse into life on set, from indie classics to blockbusters, and the collaborative spirit that unites directors, actors, production designers and crew members. Moving Still by Lauri Gaffin is published by Damiani Books. All photographs and quotes by Lauri Gaffin

Our ice cream truck at Trona Pinnacles, California (from the film Land of the Lost)

‘This is a visual diary of my 35 years as a set decorator for feature films. I’ve always been an observer and I love photography because no one can tell me how to feel when I look through the viewfinder. The moment I click the shutter I give myself over to spontaneity and intuition, to perceive without judging myself or being judged. Photography is my language, it’s where I allow my internal life to come into focus’

Directors Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden in Captain Marvel’s crashed jet (from the film Captain Marvel)

‘For this production my team shopped at specialised resources such as Aviation Warehouse in El Mirage, California (where airplanes go to die), to find a 30ft cockpit with wing tips and jet-plane parts to scatter across the dunes. The special effects crew worked the fiery debris and explosions at the site and visual effects augmented the drama in post-production’

Our version of the Chemosphere House (from the film Charlie’s Angels)

‘Production designer Michael Riva’s most complex set required a total stage build of architect John Lautner’s 1960 Chemosphere House, AKA “the flying saucer house”. It took an engineering genius to calculate the exact tilt of the huge wraparound windows to avoid revealing the camera and entire shooting crew in the reflections. Michael also designed a glittering composite panoramic backdrop of Los Angeles. To complete the mid-century concept, I decorated the interiors with Scandinavian furniture and fixtures’

Trona, California (from the film Land of the Lost)

‘I joined longtime friend and production designer Bo Welch to work with an abundance of dynamic design possibilities and to make another foray into the world of comedic fantasy. Will Ferrell played a hapless palaeontologist – reason enough to shop for reproduction skeletons, early hominid skulls and wolf penis bones from our esteemed vendors Bone Clones and Valley Anatomical Preparations’

Feast of the gods on Asgard (from the film Thor)

‘The script asked the unlikely question: What if early Scandinavians mistook aliens for gods and goddesses? We in set decorating asked a more banal question: what would those creatures like to eat? For our grand banquet scenes we acquired enormous loaves of country bread, oversize gourds, wedges of honeycomb from Bill’s Bees in Santa Monica, cornucopias, and haunches of bloody meat. We laid the tables with 94 brass goblets and had Set Masters make us 200 golden apples of Idunn from Asgard’

Babe’s deserted ice-cream stand (from the pilot for the TV show Fargo)

‘The shooting company for the Fargo television pilot traveled to Edmonton, Alberta, to find an abundance of bleak white vistas – some so hellish I couldn’t find the horizon line as I tried to capture the austerity and desolation in my photography’

Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff (from the film Iron Man 2)

‘The script made it clear that our house full of painstakingly chosen designer furnishings would be demolished in a hot-blooded feud between Tony and his friend Rhodey (Don Cheadle). We prepared ourselves with doubles and triples of everything for multiple shots involving the anticipated crashes and fires. We spent an inordinate amount of our expendables budget on imitation shattered glass (silicone) to scatter around huge broken windows. Still, the day my beautiful set lay in ruins, I cried’

Alligators! Snakes! Wasps! Oh my! (from the film Captain Marvel)

‘The production company issued a warning memo: “We are working in a swamp that is also a form of nature reserve with all the creatures that inhabit such environments. While we have taken measures to move the alligators and snakes away from areas of activity, please be on the lookout for these animals … if you encounter a snake or alligator, back away slowly and bring it to the attention of one of the snake wranglers.” Every day we made it out without getting bitten we celebrated by dining at Shaya, south of the Mason-Dixon line’

My indispensable support team (from the Fargo pilot)

‘For this project, I tried to remain true to the Coen brothers’ concept of set decoration (ie it shouldn’t look like there was any). I often surrounded the actors with cast-off, soul-crushing details. As for Paul Bunyan’s cameo? We built Babe’s, an abandoned ice cream stand with a big blue cow balanced on the roof. In the pilot, you see it when Marge frantically delivers her baby!’

Arthur at home (from the film Zathura: A Space Adventure)

‘During the filming of Zathura, as I supervised the bathtubs used, dolly grip Arthur Blum approached me about buying one of them when we finished filming. I looked into his big blue eyes and marvelled at his unique approach to flirting. After the film ended, I flirted back. I acquired one of the bathtubs and sent it over to Arthur’s house. I’m not sure why, since I was still with my boyfriend’

Gaffin on set (from the film Land of the Lost)

‘Our location at Trona Pinnacles, California, gave everyone – including the crew – the impression we’d truly arrived in the land of the lost. With stark geological towers rising from a dry lakebed, Trona is a protected national park free of bathrooms, trash services, water or vegetation – we had to truck in everything’Photograph: Anthony Carlino