SAW Namibia upgrades luxury lodge
- Details
The park’s luxurious Mokuti Etosha lodge, owned by the O&L Group, has recently undergone an extensive audio-visual transformation, designed and installed by Stage Audio Works (SAW) Namibia. As a long-standing client of SAW Namibia, the O&L Group entrusted them to completely re-imagine Mokuti Etosha’s conference space while also enhancing the surrounding pool and bar areas with an easy-to-use audio and lighting control solution. The outcome is truly remarkable and has elevated the overall experience for guests and visitors.
“O&L Leisure is a loyal client of ours and we wanted to assist them in offering their guests the highest level of audio and visual services,” advises Johadrie de Villiers, general manager at Stage Audio Works Namibia. “Whether there is great sound quality when guests are shopping for souvenirs in the gift shop, lounging next to the pool, dining in the restaurant, attending an event or when they need to conduct a video conference call whilst on holiday, Mokuti Etosha now has the technical infrastructure to offer its guests all of this and more.”
SAW Namibia devised a conferencing solution leveraging cutting-edge technology from Crestron, Sennheiser, Xilica, and Audac, crafting a distinctive experience tailored to the lodge's needs, while enabling seamless connectivity even in remote locales.
The existing conference centre at Mokuti Etosha was demolished to make way for the new solution, which comprises a stand-alone experience centre providing wired and wireless presentation capabilities, bring your own meeting (BYOM) video conferencing and basic room control that utilises a touch panel to control lights and the display power.
The conference experience centre features Crestron’s wall-mount touch screen and a Poly Studio video conferencing solution. A Samsung QB 75-inch Class HDR 4K UHD professional display smart LED screen is used to display content.
Additionally, a new, multi-purpose divisible conference room with multiple camera angles also required BYOM video conferencing and local Bluetooth audio playback, all controlled from a wall-mounted touch panel in the two conference rooms. SAW Namibia automated room configuration changes in divisible environments using Crestron Cresnet partition sensors linked to a control processor. This streamlined operations, enhanced efficiency, and optimized space utilization without manual intervention. The system also provided energy efficiency benefits by adjusting environmental settings based on occupancy, showcasing the power of automation in improving functionality and user experience.
One of the biggest changes to the conferencing space was the addition of camera tracking. SAW Namibia installed three 1Beyond AutoTracker 3 Presenter high-quality intelligent PTZ automatically tracking cameras together with three 1Beyond PTZ cameras and four Sennheiser Team Connect Ceiling 2 microphones, which are controlled via a wall-mounted touchscreen.
“We selected Sennheiser and Crestron for this project due to our longstanding partnership and unwavering confidence in their audio and video solutions respectively, particularly for conferencing” de Villiers states. "The inclusion of Crestron's 1Beyond camera tracking technology significantly enhances the lodge's event offerings, particularly with its automatic video tracking capabilities."
Together with the overhaul of the lodge’s conference offering, SAW Namibia designed and installed new sound and lighting control systems for the pool bar and restaurant at Mokuti Etosha, as well as a distributed background music system across the extended retail and pre-assembly areas.
For the restaurant, SAW Namibia supplied a Crestron DALI interface, managed by the VC4 Crestron Virtual control system with a Crestron Cameo keypad for centralised lighting control. The retail and pre-assembly areas both feature two Audac CIRA eight-inch ceiling loudspeakers each, alongside a Xilica Lucia 2 for control. “Aside from the conferencing technology, Mokuti Etosha wanted a reliable, high-quality system for background music, which is what we supplied using reliable technology from Audac, Crestron and Xilica,” explains de Villiers.
Sven Thieme, managing director of O&L Leisure and executive chairman of the O&L Group remarks: "The refurbishment has truly elevated the entire authentic Mokuti Etosha, Africa reimagined experience. We aimed not only to cater to holidaymakers and sun-seekers but also at enhancing the experience for conference attendees, wedding parties and any other special events hosted at Mokuti Etosha.”
