The Rococo Gardens in the heart of the English Cotswolds are a significant tourist attraction with Rococo architectural features and large scale avenues of trees. However: because of planning regulations and preservation of the original theme, installed electrical power is barred, thus preventing any night illumination and meaning early closure especially during winter months.
CORE Lighting was contracted to supply the company’s battery-powered and wireless-DMX (WDMX) controlled architectural lighting systems. For an evening, CORE added a splash of colour into the canopies of the trees and the unique houses. The avenues of trees and Exedra with its water feature were brought alive.
Blueprint Events, local stockists of CORE POINT20 & 30 series products for rentals, conducted the whole installation, laying out the lightweight and portable lighting units and organising the colour schemes to bring the gardens alive. With the on-board wireless system, they were able to control the whole scheme across the gardens from a couple of CORE POINT30 Master units. This enabled a scheme to be very rapidly set up from the Exedra on one side of the valley to the Eagle House across the other side, all controlled in perfect synchronisation.
“What impressed us most was the portability and flexibility of the lighting system,” said Garden Director Paul Moir. “It was possible to change the mood of a building or tree from the bright and playful to the dark and sinister at the press of a centralised button.”
“Our problem is that with no power in the garden, we literally can do nothing after dusk as we cannot get people out of the grounds,” he continued. “The logistics of long wires are out of the question and any generators would destroy the ambience, particularly for music and plays. For us, it will extend the use of the gardens into the evening as we will be able to create these atmospheric moods and light paths to show visitors around.”
“The perception of wireless lights has been established as a bit of a novelty,” said Chris Morgan of Blueprint Events. “However, the CORE POINT20 and 30 have been a surprise to all the technicians that have used them, as they out-perform many traditional mains powered fixtures. This is further enhanced with CORE’s use of White LEDs in addition to their powerful RGB array.”
