Brad Pitt has teamed up with Emmy Award-winning music producer Damien Quintard to relaunch historic Miraval Studios, where Pink Floyd, Sting, The Cure and AC/DC recorded their albums. It is being redesigned as an exclusive film and music production and post-production facility in a beautiful setting.

The studio is located in a stately wine estate, Château Miraval, which Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie rented in 2008, bought in 2011 and celebrated their wedding there in 2014. Jolie sold her 50% ownership in the property in 2021.

Spread over 1,235 acres of land in the heart of the Provence wine region, the estate occupies a private valley in the village of Correns – the first French village where everything must be grown organically by law.

The studio is part of a larger project that includes winemaking, in partnership with the Perrin family, a French leader in organic viticulture. The estate is renowned for its rosé wines.

This treasured corner of France, just a 90-minute drive from Cannes, has also attracted high-profile Hollywood neighbors within a 15-mile radius: George and Amal Clooney bought Domaine du Canadel, in 2021, and Skywalker Vineyards of George Lucas purchased nearby. Margüi Castle in 2017.

Studio Miraval, its former name, was built at Château Miraval in 1977 by French jazz pianist Jacques Loussier and sound engineer Patrice Quef, but has been dormant since 2002.

In 2021, Pitt decided to relaunch the studio and signed a joint venture with Quintard. Pitt explained his motivation for the project: “When I first set eyes on Miraval, I knew it was a remarkable place and honoring its iconic history was of the utmost importance. It’s a place where many people work to achieve the highest standards of quality, whether in winemaking or music. Miraval Studios will serve as a natural extension of our desire to facilitate a space for all possibilities.

The renovated studio will open this summer. Some of the original microphones and accessories are retained, but the new design includes a major overhaul, including bringing in more natural light.

The main studio is approximately 3,000 square feet with a 650 square foot control room.

Sound recording facilities include Dolby Atmos surround sound technology that allows sounds to be interpreted as three-dimensional objects.

The objective is not only to function as a recording and musical mixing studio, but to host film and television projects, while exploring bridges with the world of contemporary art.

This reflects the shared interests and experience of Pitt and Quintard.

Quintard is founder and CEO of The Mono Company record label and SoundX, a pioneering R&D company exploring the future of audiovisual technologies. One of SoundX’s first projects is a calibrated AI tool for people with hearing loss that translates sound into vibrations.

He won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Live-to-Tape Sound Mixing for the 2015-2016 Olympic Opening Ceremony and in 2020 was included in the Forbes 30 under 30 list in France.

Quintard also produced the sound design for the DAU project – described as the “Soviet Truman Show” – based on an immersive art installation in Paris, recreating a Soviet research institute that has generated 17 films to date, including two films including the premiere took place in 2020. Berlinale.

Variety talked to Quintard about the project

What is your main target for Miraval Studios: is it mainly for musical or cinematographic projects?

Our goal is to be open to a wide range of projects. We want to be able to respond to any type of inspiration – from pop to classical music, and from films to documentaries. It is above all a state of mind. Whether your work involves video or sound, we can provide a playground for inspiration. It opens a new door to creativity and peace of mind when writing or composing in a setting like this. It’s all about good vibes and simplicity. A director can come here and think about writing his next project. It creates space to unleash people’s creativity. The estate is located in one of the most beautiful wine estates in the world. It also has a rich history dating back to the Templars. The Prince of Naples lived here. It’s a marriage between rosé wine, olive oil, trees, music, the lake. Everything is very inspiring! It’s a great creative recipe.

The area also attracts Hollywood talent…

Yes! When George Lucas and George Clooney are your neighbors, it’s bound to inspire you to produce things related to film and video. The pandemic has accelerated the transition to online workflows when it comes to major productions. You often start a project in one country and finish it elsewhere digitally. This is also what we are going to do at Miraval. It’s not just an isolated facility. Thanks to modern technology, we can be connected to the whole industry. You will be able to feel the presence of the studio, as if it were your neighbor, even if you are in LA

How did you meet Brad Pitt and start this project?

I met Brad in early 2021 in Modern Arts. I worked on many different projects like Philippe Parreno and the site-specific installation of ARCA at MoMA in 2019. And then someone said to me, “Brad wants to meet you. It all started from there. I believe that Brad and I share the same vision of simplicity and emotions. It’s a place where we will try to create good things. This opening this summer will be very exciting.

How did Brad Pitt’s vision contribute to this project?

This is a studio for the modern age. He has brilliant ideas and a unique approach to producing things. It’s very exciting to combine our two expertise in sound and video, the two worlds collide.

What equipment will you have for film and television productions?

We can provide facilities for pre-production, production and post-production. We will have material to support any type of production, we aim to cover all the bases. For example, Studio 1 has a huge main space and a control room. It has pre-mixing for cinematic capabilities and we are working on having state-of-the-art editing and mixing rooms. We will have one of the best Dolby Atmos configurations, developed in collaboration with Dolby. I am very proud of our collaboration with Dolby. The people at Dolby understood that they had to adapt a cinema workflow to a music workflow. I am very happy with the progress made with this technology, working hand in hand before and after its release. We had the first Atmos Music studio in France and Miraval Studios will have a world-class mixing space.

Are the studios also equipped for immersive production?

Absoutely. We cover all the ground when it comes to immersive production. I continue R&D in this field via my company SoundX. I am particularly interested in ensuring that music and film are inclusive and can be adapted for people with disabilities. This is the main goal of my company SoundX, and yes I am an Elon Musk fan! For example, I found Nicolas Becker’s work on Darius Marder’s “Sound of Metal” very inspiring. He won the Best Sound Oscar and it was great to consult him on the project. It shows how you can experience music as a deaf person and we need to do more and bring these issues to light.

Will some of the lessons you learned from the DAU project carry over to this new venture?

DAU was a massive project. It was unlike anything you could imagine. We had to mix so many different influences. Greek-Russian composer Teodor Currentzis played the lead role and performed live. We worked with people like Brian Eno and Robert del Naja, and had voice overs from actors like Gérard Depardieu. Many different worlds collided. It was like being in a large collider, a particle accelerator. It was extremely inspiring.

The austere atmosphere of the DAU project is almost the opposite of Studios Miraval, but is there anything in common?

Creativity often benefits from isolation, which is found in different ways, whether at DAU or Miraval. For example, I started my career at Teodor Currentzis. He decided to go to the Uralic city of Perm. It’s minus 35°C there, a kind of Siberian city. He put his orchestra there and isolated everything. He could have gone to Berlin or Paris. He told me: ‘When you have an artistic mission and you want to succeed, you have to be able to focus on the message. Close your eyes and focus on the job. It was a crazy experience. We worked on Mozart, Mahler, Tchaikovsky. The quality was so amazing. Everyone could cancel the outside world. DAU was based on the same principle. Forget everything else and focus on the message. I find the same philosophy at Miraval. Of course, it is much more pleasant and beautiful. With vines and trees everywhere. But it’s essentially the same principle. A beautiful place doesn’t mean it has to be dated, even Versailles has had its fair share of bustle! I am essentially attached to a positive and organic view of the world. Miraval is also a complex space like any creative space. If you read Miraval’s story, you never know what’s going to happen. We want the unexpected to happen!