Sudbury business owner chosen to help with Princess Diana project

SUDBURY -

Sudbury-based entrepreneur Clifton Skelliter has his hands full these days with a new exhibit that's getting a lot of buzz.

Skelliter and his team at Launchpad Creative were chosen to design a multi-million dollar international 'walk-thru' documentary of the late Princess Diana.

'Princess Diana: Accredited Access' will be a visual journey with first-hand narration that walks patrons through her life.

Made public for the first time, Skelliter says it involves photographs from Anwar Hussein's collection, a royal photographer whose sons, Zak and Samir, grew up with Will and Harry.

"I think he was a royal photographer for like, 50, 60 years. He was there before Diana and he still does some work now. He spent so much time with Princess Diana, from the moment she was introduced to the royal family and she was introduced to the world," said Skelliter.

Skelliter says Hussein has waited a long time to share these stories about the 'people's Princess' that not everyone will know about.

He and his team got involved with the project when they were asked to help design the brand-identity for the 20,000 square foot exhibit.

"I think we coined this term, 'walk-thru documentary', because as we started working on the project, I started getting more and more involved with the story aspect. I pitched a story to the team and they really liked it where the last year and a half., we've all been stuck in our homes, binging stories and we've gotten used to a very specific style of story telling," he explained.

Skelliter says the idea was born that a patron seeing this exhibit would be given a set of headphones or they can use their own, and they would be guided through the exhibit with first-hand narration.

He says they took a lot of inspiration from shows like "The Crown" and after producers loved the idea, they stepped up to fill the role as 'creative directors.'

The exhibit will first launch in Los Angeles and Chicago in December. It'll then move to New York in the new year and there are plans to expand it north to Canada and Toronto.

"There's this huge tiara that's just floating, it's massive and it looks like it's made of gold and diamonds but it's made of paper, it's beautiful," he said.

Skelliter adds he's even been inspired with everything he's learned about DIana Spencer, her nature, her rebel-like attitude and how she looked at the world.

"And I'm going to be honest with you, I have a little bit of a crush on her," he smiled.

"This is absolutely going to stand out for me, it's an evolution for me, as a brand-being person, whatever category they want to put me in, at the end of the day I'm a story-teller, I love telling stories."

The project has already gained a lot of interest from American media.

The exhibit will be expanded to Canada after the American launch.