ParFect light for Amman military museum
- Details
The lighting was specified by Amman-based AV and IT integration solutions specialist AKTCO. The project was led by Nidal Khalifeh (CEO), George Boury (project manager), and Duaa’ Khraim (design engineer) from AKTCO who worked closely with Elie Battah, from Robe Middle East, to coordinate the supply of ParFects to this high-profile installation.
The futuristic museum building was designed by Zaid Daoud Architects. The 20,000sq.m space is divided into 12 halls showcasing the exhibits, which include illustrations of historic battles in Syria, Jerusalem and Jordan, complete with an audioscape of gunfire, roaring diesel engines and emotive speeches. Life-size replicas of soldiers poke out of tank turrets giving the exhibits a life-like feel that they are about to roll into action.
“This dramatic environment needed careful lighting,” explained Nidal, who, together with the team at AKTCO, was extremely proud to be involved in the Museum, opened in January by His Majesty King Abdullah II of Jordan, who originally decreed its creation in 2007.
The project’s realisation was a massive national and regional achievement and it has been highly acclaimed internationally as a vital and historically significant curation of military hardware.
AKTCO responded to a tender issued by the KADDB (King Abdullah 2 Deign & Development Bureau) and proposed a lighting scheme utilising the 375 x ParFect S1s, picked for the “high quality and clarity of the light output and the range of tuneable whites”.
The tender was won based on their innovative design proposals and the recommendation of using the latest Robe LED technologies to provide a long term low maintenance and aesthetically pleasing solution.
The challenges were in lighting the huge spaces involved that were needed to show off these impressive military relics in an appropriate and engaging environment.
The ParFects are controlled via a PC-based system which also handles the building control, and they can be remotely accessed via an iPad App for tweaking.
“Robe is one of the best brands we’ve worked with to date,” confirms Nidal, “and the results of this project speak for themselves. We are also impressed with the levels of technical support from Robe and are confident they are excellent partners for us.”
Ayman Takriti is AKTCO’s sound engineer who, with the rest of the team, worked intensively on site with three integration engineers - Mohammad Nofal, Mohammad Bader and Ammar Mansour. Looking after the IT side ongoing are Alaa Jarrir and Aya Jarrah.
(Jim Evans)
