Sugar Creative and St Albans Museums unveil ground-breaking XR experience

PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE DISTRIBUTION

10th June 2025 - AWE 2025, LONG BEACH

Sugar Creative and St Albans Museums unveil ground-breaking XR experience powered by Niantic Spatial’s VPS

‍Bringing Roman Britain to life like never before.

Sugar Creative, one of the UK’s leading immersive studios, has today announced a significant new project in collaboration with St Albans Museums, using Niantic Spatial’s cutting-edge Visual Positioning System (VPS) to transform historical storytelling at scale. The announcement was made ahead of Sugar’s participation at AWE 2025 in Long Beach, where Creative Director Will Humphrey will speak alongside Niantic Spatial and T-Mobile on the future of spatial XR.

The new experience reimagines the ancient Roman city of Verulamium buried beneath St Albans. Leveraging the Niantic VPS technology, the project creates a deeply immersive, location-anchored mobile experience that fuses historical fidelity with playful interaction.

From the remains of London Gate to the intricate shell mosaics and Hypocaust, visitors will explore the city through rich AR reconstructions, narrative gameplay, and real-time spatial interactions, all activated on-site at Verulamium Park.

Jason Veal, Managing Director of Sugar Creative, said:
“So much of our history is hidden in plain sight. This partnership with St Albans Museums lets us reveal Roman Britain in a way that’s never been done before - interactive, accessible, and accurate down to the centimetre, thanks to Niantic’s VPS."

William Humphrey, Creative Director of Sugar Creative, said:
“We are excited to announce this partnership, not simply because of the opportunity to work with such a forward looking cultural organisation but because it allows us to continue to creatively push the boundaries of immersing people in the past. ”

Farhana Begum, Arts, Tourism, Heritage and Culture Manager, St Albans, added:
“We’re delighted to be working with Sugar Creative on our Arts Council England supported project using augmented reality to bring the buried city of Roman Verulamium (St Albans, UK) to life.”

Joe Gabriel, Developer Relations, Niantic Spatial, said: “We’re thrilled to have been able to support Sugar Creative with the development of this new exciting project. Niantic Spatial’s Visual Positioning System is the perfect technology to anchor the rich narrative to real-world locations, creating a deeply immersive and engaging experience for visitors to St Albans.”

The experience builds on Sugar Creative’s previous large-scale XR projects, including the multi award winning 878 AD: Winchester Revealed and Wallace & Gromit: The Big Fix Up, blending interactive play with city scale cultural engagement.

The app is expected to launch to the public later in 2025, available for both iOS and Android devices.

ENDS

Notes to Editors:

‍

About Sugar Creative

Sugar Creative delivers wonder through innovation, bringing imagination to life with inspirational and incredible outcomes for everything from entertainment to marketing and science.With a proven track record in creating bold, location-based experiences, including the award-winning 878 AD: Winchester Revealed, Sugar works with world-class partners to push the boundaries of what’s possible in XR and immersive storytelling, Sugar is a proud Niantic Spatial Developer Partner, working at the cutting edge of geospatial AR. To find out more, visit https://www.sugar.agency/.

‍

About St Albans Museums

St Albans Museums care for and share the rich heritage of one of Britain’s most historic cities, from its Roman roots as Verulamium to its vibrant modern community. Operating across several sites including Verulamium Museum and St Albans Museum + Gallery, the service offers engaging exhibitions, educational programmes, and cultural experiences that connect people with the stories of their city. Through bold partnerships and innovative approaches, St Albans Museums continue to reimagine how history is explored, preserved, and brought to life.Thanks to generous funding from Arts Council England, St Albans Museums has been awarded National Portfolio Organisation status and awarded just over £1million to ensure that everyone has access to the transformational benefits of creativity and culture. 

For more, visit https://www.stalbansmuseums.org.uk/

‍

About Niantic Spatial

Niantic Spatial is a pioneer in geospatial AI, building technology that enables both people and machines to perceive and understand physical spaces in entirely new ways. Our core technology is built on a third-generation digital map, and the Visual Positioning System delivers centimeter-level precision in real-world localization. We are developing a Large Geospatial Model to deliver a semantically rich, spatially grounded understanding of real-world locations.

‍