Cherry Blossom Festival

World Square’s annual Cherry Blossom Festival brings Japan’s cherry blossom phenomenon to Sydney, in a jam packed 3 week event.

We helped bring the Cherry Blossom Festival to life via a series of digital placemaking activities that combined the physical and virtual together in magical ways, to create impactful and immersive experiences.

The centerpiece of the festivities was the custom built Torii Gate, that not only created 1000s of ‘grammable moments, but also acted as a portal to another dimension via AR, virtually converting the whole square into a dreamy cherry blossom experience in real time.

This AR experience seamlessly transitioned into an “offer hunt” that ushered our shoppers from one retailer to another to find virtual origami boxes full of goodies. A dynamic “petal path” guided them to the next offer box and encouraged them to seek and unlock more offers, promoting footfall and dwell time.

Finally, we have activated the giant screen via three Japanese inspired gamified experiences, using our unique platform combining augmented reality, skeletal and gesture tracking, depth mapping and artificial intelligence-driven live characters.

These experiences were wildly popular, hosting up to a hundred engaged users at the busiest sessions, leading to an average of 7,500 active and passive engagements per day.