A Very Special
Birthday
Celebrating 40 years of TURESPAÑA at FITUR 2024
THE CHALLENGE
How do you celebrate a 40th birthday? But not just of a person, but of a nation’s story, told through travel?
That was the question TURESPAÑA (the Spanish Tourism Institute) brought to us as FITUR 2024 approached. Not simply to build a stand, but to craft a stage for memory, for future visions, and for collective pride.
The space needed to position Spain as a global tourism leader: modern, sustainable, and emotionally resonant, while also functioning as a platform for institutional meetings, immersive experiences, live events, and high-level communications. All within just five days at IFEMA Madrid, with a footprint of over 600m² plus a separate 550m² working space for Tourism Advisors from around the world.
It had to be more than an exhibition space. It needed to become a living tribute to four decades of Spanish tourism, and a powerful symbol of the road ahead. A place for ministers and chefs, for data and dreams, for meetings and magic. And yes: somewhere in that mix, there had to be cake.
OUR APPROACH
We imagined a stand that didn’t just say “40 years. It felt it.
At its center stood a whimsical yet moving symbol: a giant birthday cake with candles that lit up the celebration. Visitors were invited to blow on them, triggering playful animations across massive LED walls: umbrellas flying, pine trees swaying, Castellers trembling in the wind.
Each breath turned into a spectacle, a ripple of joy echoing across the Agora screen. The stronger the blow, the wilder the surprise. And just like that, celebration became interaction. Memory became movement.
And yeah: there was real cake too. Four times a day, our pastelero and showman would roll out slices of the anniversary tart, inviting attendees to taste a piece of history… and also of Turespaña’s bright future.
But the cake was just one layer of this immersive narrative.
We created a timeline to walk through 40 years of travel campaigns. A photo booth to revisit holidays past, with cassette tapes and Polaroids in the background. A Leap Motion installation that let visitors explore decades of tourism data with the wave of a hand. And a time capsule, both physical and digital, where guests could tell us what part of Spain they’d preserve for the next 40 years.
We built a dual-environment setup: a main exhibition stand in Hall 9 and a fully equipped working space in Sala Retiro. The stand featured an immersive audiovisual installation with 130m² of LED screens, a Leap Motion-driven data visualization experience, and a timeline wall chronicling 40 years of iconic tourism campaigns.
All of this wrapped in a structure built for longevity: melamine-free HONEXT panels, reusable aluminum systems, LED-only lighting, and a carbon-compensated build process, every beam and screen echoing our commitment to sustainability. The focus on sustainability was not an afterthought, it was a structural principle. We even calculated and compensated the stand’s carbon footprint with tree-planting initiatives.
Engagement was central: visitors left messages for a virtual Time Capsule, posed for retro-style “Holydays along the years” photos, blew out digital candles on the interactive cake installation, and joined guided tours of the stand. For the public days, we turned the space into a celebration hub with showcooking sessions, cupcake workshops, and playful participatory events, each one of them linked to TURESPAÑA’s 40-year story.
“It was incredibly rewarding to see the challenge of uniting five distinctive brands under one concept and design come to life in such harmony.”
José Vicente Gascó, Project Manager
THE RESULT
The TURESPAÑA stand became much more than a fair presence. It became a memory.
Thousands of visitors stopped to participate.
To leave messages, snap retro photos, ice their own cupcakes, or blow out a candle for a future they believed in.
It was a celebration of place and purpose, of national pride and creative joy.
And at the heart of it all, that simple gesture: one person, one breath, one screen full of movement… reminded us why we do what we do.
At TARS Design, we don’t just build spaces. We create moments.
Moments that connect people with meaning.
Moments like a birthday wish blown into the future.
LET’S GET TO KNOW
EACH OTHER
