Fields was one of the designers of the project, finding materials from one of the countries – Germany – where tifos are a way of life for soccer fans. After getting the bases shipped over, and testing at home the paints and tapes that could be used, the next major hurdle was finding a space where such a big project could be undertaken.

As it turned out, the newly-created Väsen Brewing Company in the northern part of Richmond provided the solution.

“It kind of all started when we decided on Richmond to be the site of the brewery,” said VBC’s Nathen Winters. “We saw it was a huge soccer town. I didn’t know exactly how we were going to get involved. We just reached out to the Kickers, trying to get some events going, and even though we haven’t opened up here we had the space, so we figured we could get a little tifo event going.”

With a large enough lot next to the brewery to house the 160-square-foot banners – each large enough to cover a section of City Stadium – the Red Army’s designers and painters got to work.

“They’d never even done anything of this scale,” said Winters, “so we got together with their team and they laid everything out because they knew how they wanted it to look at the stadium, and we provided the space and a little beer on the side.”