Over 100 ADJ Fixtures Create Holiday Magic at New Miami Mall

	Arnoldo & Monica Offermann; shot By Mookie, www.ShotByMookie.com

To help shoppers get into the festive spirit, a new Miami mall installed temporary festive displays throughout its atrium areas. With a stark-white modern design, these were dramatically brought to life by over 100 ADJ lighting fixtures supplied by ADJ dealer Miami Prop Rentals supported by Robert Seher of Freed Sales.

Brickell City Centre is a landmark $1.05-billion development in downtown Miami featuring two residential towers, two mid-rise office buildings, a hotel, and a four-story atrium mall. The mall, which offers a premium shopping experience with designer stores and world-class dining establishments, opened just before the holiday season. As part of the opening celebrations Jerry Blohm, the owner of ADJ dealer Miami Prop Rentals, was contracted to install a festive display that would be in-keeping with the mall's modern design and luxury feel.

Offering prop rental and set design services, predominantly to the motion picture industry, but also to a wide variety of other clients, the team at Miami Prop Rentals is well versed in creating impressive displays. For this project, they decided on a minimalistic approach, to fit with the aesthetic of the Brickell City Centre development as a whole. Blohm's team installed a variety of large Christmas tree and snowflake shapes constructed from pieces of shaped white acrylic. To bring these to life, they knew lighting would play a significant part. So, as ADJ dealers, they looked to the company's range of reliable and affordable fixtures.

As this would be a large project, the Miami Prop Rentals team reached out to Robert Seher at ADJ's Miami-based rep company, Freed Sales, for advice on the right fixtures for the job. A recent addition to the Freed Sales team, Robert's background is in the movie business. With 20 years of industry experience, he has worked as the director of photography on a number of feature films as well as countless infomercials and reality TV show episodes. If fact, his relationship with Blohm and Miami Prop Rentals goes way back, which meant that he was well placed to offer advice on the Brickell City Centre Mall project.

Originally, the Miami Prop Rentals team planned to use low-power LED pars, as the installation called for such a large number of fixtures. However, Seher convinced them to opt for ADJ's latest high-output models to ensure enough brightness to create an impactful effect even during daylight hours. Fortunately, these came within budget. As Seher puts it, "we got them the best value for their bucks."

The primary fixture that was used for the project was ADJ's 5P HEX, which features five 10W six-in-one HEX LEDs allowing for a huge amount of color mixing potential. A total of 54 of these fixtures were deployed throughout the mall providing color washes across all the display areas. Many of these were set on the ground to up-light the Christmas trees and snowflakes, while others were rigged to supporting pipes. Both scenarios posed no problem to the 5P HEX, thanks to its flexible dual yoke that can be used either as a floor stand or hanging bracket.

To enhance the magical look of the installation, the Miami Prop Rentals team wanted the lighting fixtures to blend in as much as possible. To help with this, the 5P HEX Pearl model, with its striking white case, was used when the fixtures were placed on the ground on areas covered with white faux snow. Meanwhile, the regular black 5P HEXs worked well when the lights were attached to the vertical pipes, as these were hidden behind dark green foliage that is part of the mall's permanent decoration.

As the mall's atrium is open air, and certain parts of the installation could potentially be exposed to the elements, an IP-rated fixture was also required. For this, ADJ's WiFLY QA5 IP was chosen, which offers five 5W four-in-one RGBA LEDs as well as the added advantage of wireless connectivity. These fixtures were positioned on areas of grass at the mall's entrances, illuminating further acrylic Christmas trees and snowflakes.

Six ADJ Stinger II and seven Jelly Gressor fixtures were also installed to overlay the color washes with a spinning "confetti" effect to add to the installation's festive feel. The rig was then completed by four ADJ Inno Spot Pro LED-powered moving heads, used to project custom gobos of snowflakes and the words "Happy Holidays," as well as the "Brickell City Centre" logo.

Going above and beyond his role as a sales rep, Seher also programmed an ADJ DMX Operator to control the moving heads. These were set to slowly move around the floor, ceiling, and walls of the mall's main central space. Seher then helped the installers to setup the rest of the fixtures running color fades using their internal programs. This created the desired "rainbow of colors" effect, without the need for any DMX programming or cabling. Groups of WiFLY QA5 IPs, however, were linked together using their wireless capability for synchronized master/slave operation within specific areas.

Throughout the holiday season the ADJ fixtures were worked very hard, running constantly from 7:00am in the morning to 11:00pm at night, day in and day out. But, Seher and the Miami Prop Rentals team had no problems when installing all 112 fixtures and that they've run reliably all the way through the installation's run.

Helping to create a festive atmosphere, the project was a big hit with shoppers of all ages throughout the holiday season. Its success was down to the creative partnership between ADJ, Miami Prop Rentals, and Seher at Freed Sales. When we talked to Seher about the collaboration, he shared a little background into this creative process. "When customers ask for my ideas on an installation," he told us, "I approach it like I would a film project. When you're shooting a feature film, you're trying to create emotion. It's just the same with lighting, I try to create emotion. I try to incorporate that same idea of connecting with people on an emotional level. So, the washes, the beams, the 'confetti' effects, are all tools for trying to create that connection when people walk into each of the areas."

And, that's certainly what happened at the Brickell City Centre Mall, with Miami Prop Rentals' modern take on a winter wonderland attracting the attention of hordes of passing shoppers. The sweeping gobos, spinning "confetti dots," and rainbow washes drew in kids of all ages to gaze on the festive scene, evoking the emotion of a cold winter's day, despite the Miami heat!