latest news headlines
J&C Joel at the Roundhouse
J&C Joel has manufactured and installed several curtain and tracking systems in the newly refurbished high profile Roundhouse performing arts venue in London’s Camden Town.
J&C Joel was asked onboard by John MacKinnon, technical manager of the Roundhouse, with a brief to provide a bespoke track and drape system that would withstand the rigors of touring productions whilst being mindful of the general Roundhouse aesthesis.
Track Position 1 traverses the Inner Radius of the main room, running approximately 82 metres with a 13 metre radius. It is Triple-E Unirail and is fixed to the 48 small diameter spreader bars that radiate out from the main Victorian structural metalwork.
Twenty-five black woolserge drapes were supplied to hang on these tracks. Each drape is 3 metres wide with 50% fullness and a 7.5 metre drop. The top of the drapes have golf bag hooks and there’s spot Velcro on the sides to join them together. The drapes are made from J&C Joel’s heavier 560/600gms per sq metre woolserge chosen for its special acoustic properties.
For Track Positions 2 and 3 – track position 2 runs in line with the balcony handrail and track 3 follows the radius of the outer wall – J&C Joel supplied a completely separate track system.
Track 2 is linked with track 3 with the total linear length measuring 260 metres. This is again constructed from Triple-E Unirail and attached to the small diameter spreader bars radiating out from the Victorian metalwork. Where track 2 becomes track 3 around the perimeter wall, the spacing of the spreader bars is much greater at 3.2 metres, so additional steelwork has been added to spread the load.
For the balcony and wall tracks, 35 black Woolserge drapes are installed to Track Position 2, each measuring 3 metres wide with 50% fullness and a 4.10 metre drop, manufactured to the same specification as track 1’s drapes.
In the separate TV Studio, J&C Joel has installed two 20m parallel Triple-E Unirail tracks, specially shaped to follow the curves, contours and angles of the walls. They are filled with a black Woolserge drape 20 metres wide by 2.5 metres drop and 50% fullness. The heavier grade 560/600gms per sq metre Woolserge was also used in this area, again for superior acoustics.
For the same Studio track, J&C Joel made a 10 point 20 metre wide by 2.5 metre drop white filled cloth - without fullness.
J&C Joel has also supplied various sections of Triple-E Unitrack to the Roundhouse that is designated as “Portable”, and can be deployed in different areas as and when required.
The installation was co-ordinated by contracts director Mark Taylor and carried out by J&C Joel’s in-house installation teams over a two-week period.
The biggest challenge was ensuring that the radius curves were bent correctly. As usual the J&C Joel survey team’s skills were spot on and there was no tweaking to be done!
18th July 2006
HEADLINES
news archive
search stories
FOOTNOTE: Select the news type you require in the red band above; this will enable you to see the current news stories from that section
© 1999 - 2012 Entertainment Technology Press Limited News Stories
