The venue is one of the most successful independently owned casinos in the country, and is a complete new build on the footprint of the former old Royal Opera House Theatre, which had a colourful history dating back to the 19th century.
After many years of dereliction, the old building was demolished in 2004 and replaced with a new construction designed by architects Frame International. Frame also created the interior design and asked PAI onboard to work closely alongside them on the specification of a complete technical infrastructure.
PAI's Paul Adams, LTP's Terry Reeves and Frame International collaborated to ensure that the aesthetic elements blended seamlessly into one coherent overall contemporary vision. Frame has a penchant for utilising light rather than paint to create mood, ambience, colour and texture - and this project was no exception. The result, the Opera House is a completely relaxed, modern environment - a far cry from a "hard gambling" institution - with some classic theatrical touches including a strong sense of colour.
Twenty-three 42 inch plasma screens are installed throughout the Opera House - which includes the main gaming room and Rosie's Bar and lounge on the ground floor and a restaurant, lounge and private dining room upstairs. Two additional plasmas in the foyer area provide separate channels of TV advertising running a user-updatable Inspiration Matters Inspired Signage package. This is delivered from a two channel media player spec'd by PAI, and this content can also be patched to other screens in the venue if desired.
A 10 foot motorised screen and a 3,000 Lumen projector at the back of Rosie's Bar provides an area for special events and presentations. "We wanted to make it as flexible as possible," says Adams. PAI also installed the eight channel TV network that delivers a combination of video sources that are patchable to any destination.
Downstairs in the main gaming room, the clients wanted to make a statement with a video feature flanking the bar. Frame International provided the design for two elegant portrait format video screens and Paul Adams came up with the technical solution. These are fed by fed by four Samsung projectors - two per screen - using an edge-blending solution covering top and bottom sections of the screen respectively, making one complete image.
Eye-catching bespoke content was commissioned by PAI and produced by Inspiration Matters, comprising slickly silhouetted Bond Girls gyrating against a backdrop of fire. This is stored on and replayed by another Inspired Signage player.
PAI designed a background music sound system consisting of TOA speakers to cover all areas of the venue evenly. This is split into eight different areas via a Cloud 8 channel zoner, and takes input from a variety of sources including DVD and CD players. In front of the main bar in the main gaming room is a small area with a grand piano which is utilised for live performance and presentations. This has its own independent flown PA system above, also featuring TOA speakers, complete with a small mixer built into the main audio rack.
LTP's Terry Reeves was asked by Frame Associates to specify a series of specialist indoor and outdoor architectural lighting products to produce the colours and type of lighting they wished to use. LTP also drew up the system design schematic from which the electrical contractor worked during the actual fit up.
The venue's owner/operators, Nikolas and Becky Shaw were also integrally involved in the development of the lighting, and examined every fixture themselves, all of which had to be to the highest specifications. In the reception and bar areas, LTP specifi
