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i-Vision at Flamingos
i-Vision has designed, supplied and installed a seriously funky colour changing LED lighting system for Flamingos, a brand new gay clubbing destination concept in central Bristol.
The 900 capacity club is independently owned by Stuart Hayles, who saw a gap in the market for a really top notch gay nightclub in Bristol, England’s sixth largest city – and its surrounding areas.
He asked i-Vision’s Luke Dodd to design the lighting following Dodd’s eye-catching scheme at L!QU!D, a new club in Chepstow also owned by Hayles. “Lighting is absolutely fundamental to creating and enhancing moods, and no cutting edge clubbing environment is complete without good lighting and sound these days” he says.
Dodd initially looked at the building – which was once a bank and includes many original features including vaults and strong room doors – and “Immediately knew what lighting would suit the space and create the sort of ambience Stuart wanted”.
The main room (Arena 1) features R’n’B and dance music, a bar and a VIP area upstairs. Its walls are up-lit with 18 of i-Vision’s Lumos 3 fittings, “The perfect fixture for the job” says Dodd. Three bubble tanks behind the bar (an integral element of Dodd’s creative concept) are lit with a total of 6 Lumos strip 300 fittings.
The VIP room also features two large bubble tank windows overlooking the main dance floor – a great place for checking all the action below – and these are also each lit with 2 Lumos 600 strips. When switched on, they provide an opaque privacy screen for the VIP area, and when off, there’s a clear two way view between VIP room and dancefloor.
The recessed front windows of the club are illuminated with 3 Lumos 1200 strips, creating a lightbox type effect, and clearly identifying the club from the other frontages in West Street.
Behind the main room are a series of interlocking ‘Vault Bars’ – small rooms serviced by another bar, and these are lit with 24 Lumos 3 downlighters. “These spaces are really small and intimate,” explains Dodd, “And the trick was lighting them so they appeared inviting and intriguing rather than claustrophobic”. The labyrinthine Vault Bars lead through to Arena 2 at the back of the premises, a completely separate room that features the best of dirty, funky house music.
The Lumos fittings are all driven by i-Vision’s Lumos Drive units. A LumosDrive 216 for Arena 1, three Lumos Drive 36s for the front windows and signage and another two for the Vault Bars.
These were programmed up with nine bespoke user-selectable sequences by Dodd, removing the need for an external lighting controller, and reinforcing the cost-effectivity of the installation.
Flamingos is currently open Thursdays through Saturdays with live performance/PAs every Saturday, and it’s been an immediate success as word has quickly spread on the gay scene that it’s the place to be seen.
5th March 2007
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