We Asked Set Designers What They Think of Trump's Tower of 'Legal Documents'

While Trump stood at a podium flanked by American flags, he was also accompanied by a table displaying stacks of papers in manila folders. The folders, which lacked any clear labels or markings of order, were explained by Trump as, "some of the many documents that I've signed turning over complete and total control to my sons."

However, according to CNN, journalists were not allowed to see the contents of the folders, meaning nobody knows how real the alleged legal documents are, or if there were any real documents included at all.

So we turned to professional set designers, whose jobs are to make props and sets look real for film, stage, and television, to find out how convinced they were by the towering visual aid.

"I thought it to be so comical and absurd," said Katherine Salnek, a Canadian art director who's worked as a prop master on commercials and a feature film. "When you see stacks of paper like that [on a tv show or film], it gives it a certain vibe of someone who has a cluttered mind and too much on their plate." If she were to create a similar tower of legal documents, she would organize them differently, she said. "When you want to depict someone who's on the ball, the stacks are very mathematically laid out. There's form and function with everything on the table." This would include some signs of obvious organization or color coding — especially if they're important documents.

Not only did the organization system raise red flags for Salnek, but the sheer amount of stacks made little sense. "One or two companies couldn't be more than a couple of inches high," she said. Trump didn't clarify the amount of companies, instead saying the stacks of paper represented the vague sum of, "many, many."

Adam Belanger, a set designer who works in theater, commercials, and television also isn't convinced. "They definitely do look fake, unused and [the papers look] taken out of the box," said Belanger. "They don't look shuffled enough as though anyone's been through them. There's a certain way things look lived in when you're dressing sets and this just looks like it hasn't been from any office or examined."

Both agree they'd do things differently if they wanted to make a pile of documents look official or real. "If it's going to be in the foreground, it should be textured and the edges should be worn to a certain extent to make them look fresh," Salnek said.

Belanger thinks folders—especially unmarked folders—were a bad idea if trying to pass the documents off as important or organized. "I don't know why he just wouldn't have the boxes and at least make them look organized."