Behind the Magic: How Great Ormond Steet Hospital Captured Real Christmas on Its Wards

For many families, Christmas at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) looks very different from the festive scenes most of us take for granted. This year, the GOSH Charity set out to show exactly what that reality feels like through a new advert made entirely in-house.

Filmed over last year’s holiday period, the spot captures real children, real parents, and real staff as they navigate treatment, play, celebration and uncertainty, all threaded together by the charity’s mission to make every moment matter.

Senior brand content manager Charlotte Young shares how the team navigated the complexities of working inside a functioning hospital, the trust required to film families at their most vulnerable, and why authenticity was the only approach for a story this intimate.

LBB> What inspired this year’s Christmas campaign?

Charlotte> Great Ormond Street Hospital Charity (GOSH Charity) marked the launch of this year’s Christmas Appeal with a brand-new advert, featuring fly-on-the-wall moments filmed with seriously ill children who spent last Christmas on the wards at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH). The film was inspired by the magical moments GOSH Charity brings to the hospital each Christmas, all to help make the hospital feel more like home for children receiving treatment. From decorating trees with the Play team to bedside ballet performances organised by GOSH Arts, these moments help to bring comfort, creativity and joy to children and families spending time over the festive period at GOSH.

LBB> Why did you decide to create the advert entirely in-house rather than partnering with an external agency?

Charlotte> Capturing stories and content within the hospital environment poses unique challenges. We are working with patients, families and staff during incredibly difficult times, which needs to be handled with the utmost care and sensitivity. With extensive experience of working in the hospital setting, GOSH Charity’s in-house production team are able to navigate this environment with compassion, while capturing powerful content that always puts patient and family wellbeing first. Combined with Tom Paul Martin’s expertise as a director and editor, we were able to work as a small, agile team, capturing footage that shows how GOSH Charity helps make every moment matter for seriously ill children at GOSH over Christmas.

We needed to be prepared for anything, ensuring that patients and families were comfortable with us filming their journey, being in the right place at the right time, and working around appointments, children’s wellbeing, availability and festive activities.

Filming could only be facilitated by an in-house team who were on hand throughout the Christmas period to respond quickly to opportunities and navigate changes in schedules.

The benefit of bringing this campaign in-house was being able to draw on the strong existing relationship between the hospital and charity. Production ran smoothly, with the film team liaising directly with multiple hospital wards and departments throughout. Crucially, it was the relationships and trust built with parents by the Charity’s Film and Family Stories team that allowed us to capture the scenes of GOSH patients sleeping in the run-up to Christmas, which open and close the film and offer a glimpse “behind the curtain” at GOSH.

LBB> The film uses real, fly-on-the-wall footage of families spending Christmas on the wards. What motivated this decision to use real moments rather than scripted or recreated scenes?

Charlotte> GOSH Charity’s brand is centred around being child-focused and authentic. We only ever feature real people -- patients, families and staff -- in genuine reportage moments. For this film, we wanted to give the public a behind-the-scenes look at what takes place at GOSH during the Christmas period – the magic, the hard work, the joy, the sadness, and all the moments in between. Crucially, we wanted to highlight how GOSH Charity and our generous supporters make a tangible difference to the lives of seriously ill children and their families over the festive period, with storytelling that engages the public on a more emotional level.

We are fortunate that magical moments genuinely happen at GOSH all year round. Choosing to film with real patients was the easy part, the challenge was working out a way to film these moments safely and in a way that was fun for the families involved.

LBB> How did you decide which children and families to feature in the advert, and what considerations did you have to make around that process?

Charlotte> GOSH Charity has rigorous processes in place to ensure the safety and wellbeing of everyone involved in filming. We focused on children and families who were comfortable sharing their GOSH journeys with us and wanted to spotlight a range of different stories -- including children with different conditions, ages, genders and backgrounds to ensure we truly represented the hospital community. We are extremely grateful to everyone who let us tell their story and feel privileged to have been part of their Christmas at GOSH.

We wanted to highlight how GOSH Charity helps make every moment matter for seriously ill children at Christmas. This includes funding the team of Play therapists who bring fun and laughter to the wards, as well as Christmas parties which help create a sense of magic for those spending the festive period in hospital. Our GOSH Arts programme also features prominently – including our resident ballerina who helped inspire the wider campaign.

LBB> Can you walk us through the pre-production and production process — who directed and edited the film, and what made them the right fit for such an emotionally delicate project?

Charlotte> Pre-production is a complex and multifaceted process. It begins with a series of creative brainstorms to identify which Christmas moments to focus on and where resources should be prioritised, given our smaller crew. We built on our knowledge of what happens at GOSH over Christmas and then reached out to hundreds of hospital staff to see which families might be in the hospital and comfortable taking part. Central to this is clear communication and careful stewardship of families to accommodate their availability and preferences.

Pre-production also requires balancing careful planning with the uncertainty of not knowing who is going to be in the hospital until the last minute. The production process is just as complex, with some shoots being confirmed as late as the same morning. Post-production involves the creation of a series of selection reels to try and cherry-pick key moments from 35 hours of footage into a film of less than two minutes.

We commissioned Tom Paul Martin to direct and edit the film. Tom has worked with GOSH Charity on a number of different projects on a freelance basis, so we knew he had a good understanding of our brand and shared our goals for what we hoped to achieve. Tom is hugely creative, collaborative and adaptable and worked seamlessly with the in-house team throughout. He is brilliant at finding solutions to problems and worked tirelessly to ensure we created a film of the highest quality that truly rivals some of the biggest brands.

LBB> What were the biggest challenges of filming in a working hospital environment, especially during such a sensitive time of year, and how did the team overcome them?

Charlotte> Our number one priority is ensuring that children and families are comfortable and have a positive experience filming with us. We support patients and families throughout the process, meeting with them in advance and clearly outlining what is involved – including where the film will be shown, so there are no surprises and everyone is fully informed and onboard.

There are some obvious challenges. The hardest part of a shoot like this is the ever-changing production schedule. This requires the team to be extremely flexible, adapting to multiple changes in the schedule so we can accommodate patients and families without causing disruption to the hospital. We worked closely with over 80 members of staff across 15 hospital locations to ensure we didn’t interrupt their crucial work. We simply couldn’t make these films without the generosity and support of hospital staff, who were incredibly helpful throughout the filming process.

Filming discreetly on hospital wards and working with children (and sometimes even animals!) also presents challenges. These are mitigated by keeping the lines of communication open between the hospital and GOSH Charity. We brought a bag of Christmas games, activities and props for children to play with. Sometimes these moments made it into the final film and sometimes they served as icebreakers, helping the children feel comfortable. This often led to surprising, joyful moments in the film.

LBB> Has GOSH produced in-house campaigns before, and what does the in-house creative team look like in practice for a project of this scale?

Charlotte> GOSH Charity’s in-house film team produces content for a wide range of campaigns across fundraising and brand marketing. From campaign launch films to digital adverts and OOH billboards, the team is highly creative, multi-skilled and agile.
The team supports all of the charity’s campaigns, including stewarding patients and families, liaising with hospital staff and researchers, working within the strict guidelines of a busy NHS Trust, developing creative concepts, designing artwork and upholding our brand identity and tone of voice. The team also collaborates with external agencies and freelancers.

The in-house film production team is small but highly effective, consisting of senior film maker Kieran, senior film producer Steph, and film coordinator Chloe. They work closely with colleagues across content, design, brand marketing and communications to support every aspect of the wider creative campaign across multiple channels.

LBB> With so many Christmas campaigns launching each year, why was it important for GOSH Charity to contribute something — and what do you hope audiences take away from this film?

CharlotteCharlotte> GOSH Charity exists to support the hospital’s most urgent needs and raises money to help give seriously ill children the best chance, and best childhood possible. No child should ever have to spend Christmas in hospital, but when they do, GOSH Charity stops at nothing to make sure Christmas still feels like Christmas, even if it is spent on the wards.

GOSH Charity’s brand is all about finding the joy in childhood, whatever the circumstances. This message is at the core of everything we do, but it resonates especially strongly at Christmas. This campaign is a step forward towards establishing GOSH Charity as a brand leader when it comes to Christmas.

To help make every moment matter for seriously ill children at GOSH this Christmas, visit gosh.org/christmas.