A project of Triyar Entertainment Group, Dakota is a new build venue that fills a niche in owner Shawn Yari's string of Scottsdale properties that include Maya Day + Nightclub, The District and the W Scottsdale Hotel. "All of the properties have different niches," explains Adrian de Pamphilis, owner of Fyxx Entertainment. "Dakota caters to a bit older and more professional clientele than Maya and The District, which target more the younger 20-something crowd."
Dakota is located next to the W Scottsdale Hotel and is a 24/7 multi-use venue that serves food morning to night. "Customers to Dakota are often hotel guests," Adrian continues. "They can get their coffee there in the morning, have a business lunch in the afternoon, and enjoy an elegant dinner in the evening. It attracts more of a 30-something crowd and is very tasteful. Although it's a bit quieter than Maya and The District, when the sun goes down it transforms into more of a club atmosphere with live DJs and bottle and VIP service."
The venue required a flexible lighting system that could change with the situation while bringing the venue to life after dark. While owner Shawn Yari is known to come with his own ideas on what he'd like to see as far as lighting at his properties, with Dakota he left the lighting decisions up to Fyxx Entertainment, who were contracted to custom-design a dynamic lighting system. Adrian, Fyxx's Gabriel de Pamphilis and lighting designer Jason Jones co-designed the lighting scheme.
Used to centre light the tables when in dining mode are Platinum Profile LEDs, moving head fixtures that can dress the tables in a choice of colours including white. The energy-efficient luminaires also house framing shutters so that illumination of each table is exact. Once the tables are cleared, the fixtures seamlessly shift into nightclub lighting mode, using its movement, colours, graphics and effects possibilities to instantly change the atmosphere from dining decorative to dance floor dynamic.
Then the rest of the lighting rig comes to life. Mounted in a grid above the dance floor are EPV762 moving head LED panels, high-resolution 7.62mm pixel pitch video panels that give the space a unique visual look by rotating just like a moving yoke light fixture.
While top local DJs provide the dance beat from atop a raised custom-designed DJ booth, mounted within it on each side to energize the space in quick bursts of movement and effect are Elation Sniper 2Rs.
The dynamic lighting scheme at Dakota continues to an outdoor patio area visible from the street where compact IP65-rated American DJ Wifly QA5 RGBA wash fixtures and Elation 4-head LED Event Bars are used to uplight olive trees, as well as the building's outdoor façade on two sides.
(Jim Evans)
