Meet Candy Holland – the roller coaster designer

We want a job dreaming up roller coasters, Candy – how do we get into it?

Do you have a favourite part of the design process?

I love all of it, but especially coming up with ideas at the beginning: you have the chance to imagine all sorts of crazy things that initially don’t seem possible and the fun bit is then working out how to make them a reality. After that it’s very exciting to see a design come to life, but my absolute favourite part is when the attraction opens. Being there to see the first guests run up, get on the ride and then hearing their screams of delight is fantastic. It’s good hearing guests’ comments because we always aspire to be better.

If we wanted a ’coaster for our back garden and had $1 million (Dh3.7 million) to spend, what might we get?

Not a lot! Health and safety is right at the top of the list of essential requirements so that means the quality of the design, manufacturing and engineering needs to be very, very high. You can buy a small, kiddy-coaster that doesn’t do much more than go round for that kind of price.

Is $50 million more like a typical budget for a roller coaster?

Not $50 million, because we like to think we can be more creative and clever for far less than that. You could spend $8 million and you could easily spend up to 20, although a theme park typically consists of a wide variety of experiences, and it is not always the big-budget attractions that are the most captivating. For example, a simple, immersive Lego brick-building experience within a Legoland resort may only require a budget of around $150,000, but still deliver a fantastic experience for a family with young children.

Do you think that superlatives like ‘world’s fastest’ – such as the Formula Rossa roller coaster at Ferrari World in Abu Dhabi – will always pull in a crowd?

Absolutely – although instead of stealing the crown, why not create a new kind of hat altogether? There’s a market for a different type of experience.

What can you tell us about Legoland Dubai?

Are no two projects the same?

Finally, what theming opportunities leap to mind if someone wanted to add some kind of ride to the Burj Khalifa?

Ooh! Depends on who it’s for. If you’re going for pure adrenaline then maybe something to do with base jumping; if it was for five-year-old kids then space and flight or having special superpowers come to mind.