Altman shines at Guardian Angel Cathedral
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Desiring an updated LED lighting system to more effectively illuminate their worship environment, the church worked with lighting consultant Bill Brennan, principal with Just Lighting, Inc., and 4Wall Entertainment who supplied the design with Gallery and Spectra Cyc 100 luminaires from Altman Lighting.
“This was the first time that 4Wall had worked with the church which was originally built in the 1960’s, and it really is a Las Vegas landmark,” began Barbara Brennan, 4Wall senior account executive. “Their existing lighting system was about 10 years old, so we were brought onto the project by the lighting consultant to update their outdated conventional fixtures. They wanted to look at an LED solution for both the power and maintenance cost savings, so we installed a system with the Gallery and Spectra Cyc 100 luminaires to light the sacristy and the large mosaic behind the altar.”
As the team at 4Wall got started on the design, it would be imperative that the new lighting solutions be able to blend in with the sanctuary, while still being able to overcome the challenges of the architecture.
“It’s a very interesting structure that is actually in the shape of a triangle with a really high roof,” adds Brennan. “Part of the challenge of the project was that there was nowhere to place the fixtures as they wanted to maintain the aesthetics of the historic building. Originally, it seems the space was designed to use a lot of daylight for the worship services during the day, so there was not a lot of places to actually hang fixtures. We really had to focus on what were the right fixtures for the job to help us overcome the lighting challenges of the project.”
Turning their attention to solution needed to light the sacristy and altar, the fixtures would need to be in a small form factor, but still capable of providing a broad, even wash of light. Having seen the capabilities of the Gallery LED Series on a previous project, Brennan was sure they would be up to the task.
“As we were looking at the fixtures to light the sacristy, the church did not want the fixtures to be overpowering, and they didn’t want to see them,” explained Brennan. “On a previous casino project, Tim Bachman had shown me the Gallery product line, and since it is such a powerful fixture in a small casing, with multiple lensing options, we knew it would be a great solution. We now have 24 total fixtures, 12 on each side, attached to Unistrut and tied back into the dimmer rack.
“When I looked at the large and colourful mosaic behind the altar, I saw it as almost a backdrop or a theatrical cyc,” adds Brennan. “To light it, we needed to have a dynamic white, so we used the tunable white Spectra Cyc 100 luminaires because they could give us a really nice, flat wash all the way up. For their placement, there is a marble façade on stage that allowed us to tuck the cyc fixtures behind it in a ground cyc application that looks beautiful.”
(Jim Evans)
