In the centre of the Dutch countryside, the groundbreaking new conference centre has been constructed according to strict sustainable principles, making maximum use of natural materials and recycling as much as possible. The Veerkracht Ecocentre is partially built into a large mound of earth, allowing the soil to handle much of the insulation requirements of the building naturally, and is roofed with turf and grass. But this is no medieval shack; inside is a state-of-the-art meeting centre.
AV installation specialist Dave Shiphorst, who is responsible for all of the audio-visual systems at the Veerkracht centre and was part of the small team of enthusiasts that built the centre themselves without using a contractor, explains the thinking behind it. "Most conference centres aren't very green - there are lots of big rooms, lights and air conditioning, and everyone visits in their own car. Our aim was to build a state-of-the-art centre with good transport connections, and combine that with sustainable principles - so our chairs are restored 80-year-old wooden chairs, our catering is done exclusively with local produce to keep the food miles low, and we use paper coffee cups which we also burn in our furnaces to help to heat the building.
"We combine all that with centrally controlled AV systems, and I can raise and lower the chandeliers and activate the display screens, projectors and audio systems from my iPhone."
Hanging in the main auditorium and handling the audio duties for the conference centre's AV system is a QSC KLA Line Array composed of eight full-range KLA12 elements (four per channel) and four KW181 subwoofers. "I sold and installed QSC products for a living for many years," explains Shiphorst, "I am a major fan of both QSC amplifiers and speakers. When Sam Verwaijen, the centre's owner, asked me to work with him at the Veerkracht Centre, I said that the speakers had to be QSC. Sam trusts my judgement, and once he heard the KLAs, he was convinced.
"Now that they are installed, the QSCs sound really great - I am so pleased. Mark Bailey from QSC came to tune the system, but he didn't really have to do much - my years working with QSCs were put to good use when I hung the arrays here. He was impressed by the speaker placement and the sound we've achieved here, and I think the centre was a bit of an eye-opener for him, too."
(Jim Evans)
